


Unfurl These Wet Wings

by Safraninflare



Series: I Want to Love, and to Be Loved [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Background Relationships, Ballet AU, F/M, Fluff and Angst, I couldn't write slow burn if jane austen herself crawled up my ass and possessed me, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Minor Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth, Minor Dorothea Arnault/Ingrid Brandl Galatea, Minor Marianne von Edmund/Hilda Valentine Goneril, Minor Sylvain Jose Gautier/Mercedes von Martritz, Mutual Pining, The Grumpy One is Soft For the Sunshine One, mentions of suicidal ideation, no beta we die like Glenn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:15:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 42,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23397610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Safraninflare/pseuds/Safraninflare
Summary: “Wait… Were you the one that set the stage on fire during a performance of Le Papillion last summer?” Felix asked.“It was a freak accident!” she squeaked.Felix bit his tongue to keep back the retort he really wanted to give. “But why put her with me? I’ve worked my ass off for this!”With Dimitri in reluctant retirement, Felix Hugo Fraldarius was on his way to be the new top male dancer in the Seiros Ballet Company.Hot off the trails of a disaster viral video, Annette Fantine Dominic found herself chasing her past.With both their careers on the line, they're paired for a pas de deux that seems destined to fail until sparks fly offstage. Will falling in love save their performance, or send everything they've worked for up in flames?
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Series: I Want to Love, and to Be Loved [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1728637
Comments: 56
Kudos: 131





	1. The Prisms of Our Dreams Intersect

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: I haven't taken ballet since I was a literal child, and if I tried to do anything resembling a plie all of my bones would crunch and we might have to make a trip to the hospital. If things are inaccurate, I'm sorry. We're all out here doing our best.
> 
> This is dedicated to mimimirai on tumblr for listening to all of my garbage headcanons, MadamHyde of the felannie metal band AU for inspiring me to actually write this AU that I've had a blank doc for since before Christmas, and this ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyAdb6xTel8 ) video in particular for reminding me why the fuck I'm bisexual.
> 
> I hope you enjoy.

Felix Hugo Fraldarius could not fucking believe what his life had come to. After the Seiros Ballet’s primary male dancer, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd suffered a career-ending injury the December before last, Felix knew that he was the next pick to succeed his childhood friend. He was the only other male dancer in the whole company who had the strength, the grace, the _dedication_ to make it to the top. Yet when Byleth, the company’s head choreographer, announced the set for the Spring charity showcase, he was floored.

“Who the hell is Annette Dominic?” he asked as he burst into the studio, his eyes leveled on the choreographer’s. 

She turned to him with the poised grace of a former _prima_ , her pink lips turned down in a tight frown. Before she could respond, however, they were both interrupted by the sound of a crash, followed by a squeak, and finally a soft _“Who put that plant there?”_

The studio door opened, and a petite redhead found her way inside. She put her giant orange water bottle down in the corner, then dusted off a bit of dirt that clung to the soft pink of her leg warmers. The woman looked at Felix, then at Byleth, before all the color drained from her face.

“Am I late?” she asked.

“No,” Byleth smiled. “You’re right on time. Felix, meet Annette. Annette, Felix. She came highly recommended from the Fhirdiad Ballet.” 

Fhirdiad Ballet? They were pretty prestigious, so she probably wasn’t completely hopeless, but when there were dancers like Petra and Dorothea or even fucking _Hilda_ in the company, how could Byleth put her with some complete nobody?

Unless, she wasn’t a complete nobody. Her pumpkin-orange hair reminded her vaguely of Sylvain’s, but there was something else that unsettled him. Fhirdiad Ballet, Fhirdiad Ballet… That was when it hit him. There was a viral video that got passed around the circuit for a while last year, one that even he had seen.

“Wait… Were you the one that set the stage on fire during a performance of _Le Papillion_ last summer?” Felix asked.

The deepening scarlet of her face was enough to answer his question.

“It was a freak accident!” she squeaked. “The effects guy ended up getting fired, no one was hurt, and it wasn’t really my fault!” 

Felix never thought he’d be forced to dance with a _corps de ballet_ dancer who had managed to _fouetté_ straight into an open flame, but no shitty dubstep remix on Tik Tok could make this any better. 

“And you let her into our company?” he spat, still not looking at Annette. 

Byleth rolled her eyes. “She’s friends with Mercedes, and her father used to dance for Seiros. Plus, her audition made _Seteth_ tear up.” 

Felix bit his tongue to keep back the retort he _really_ wanted to give. “But why put her with me? Stick her with Sylvain, or Dedue. I’ve worked my ass off for this!” 

“Should I… go?” Annette asked, shifting awkwardly from foot to foot as she watched the two argue. “I— This feels like a private conversation, and really, if Felix doesn’t want to dance with me I could just… Do something else?” 

“No.” Byleth and Felix said the word at the same time, staring daggers at the petite woman. 

Byleth and Annette seemed rather taken aback by Felix’s statement. After all, just seconds earlier he had been complaining. The thing about Felix Hugo Fraldarius, however, was that he wasn’t a quitter. He was confident in his skills, and so long as Pippy Longstocking over there didn’t set the stage ablaze again, he would work his ass off to make sure that he looked fantastic.

So, Felix squared up his shoulders and slung a long, lithe leg over the barre to begin warming up. “Are we starting or what?”

—

The theme of this year’s charity showcase was times of day, with five _pas de deux_ to showcase Dawn, Morning, Noon, Dusk, and Night. Byleth had choreographed them for dusk, with music composed by the company’s first violinist, Edelgard. 

It was a straightforward, yet difficult piece, one that he would have had no trouble dancing with one of his tried and true partners. He knew how they worked, but Annette? She was a complete mystery. 

The piece began with Annette, symbolizing the last bit of daylight, gliding across the stage and falling into a series of _pirouettes_ and _fouettés_. When on her own, Felix could see why she was chosen for the Seiros Ballet. 

She had serious talent and a turnout that could rival Dorothea’s. She was apparently recommended by Mercedes, but the fact that her father used to dance for Seiros was what probably cemented her position in the company. 

The problem came when Felix, symbolizing the encroaching night, came on stage. He was supposed to meet her, and through a series of turns and lifts attempt to seduce her towards his kingdom. His steps were flawless, his technique brilliant, but the chemistry between them just wasn’t there. 

“Okay,” Byleth clapped. “That’s enough for today. You can tell Hilda and Claude they can come in.” 

“Well that was… something?” Annette wiped a sheen of sweat from her brow, then downed what seemed like the entirety of her giant water bottle. She chewed on the corner of her bottom lip, trying her hardest to avoid eye contact with Felix. It wasn’t that she was scared of him, no. He just constantly looked like he’d rather be anywhere than near her. To be fair, it was the same look her father gave her whenever she was so unfortunate as to be stuck in a room with him. 

“This isn’t going to work,” Felix said. Annette opened her mouth to protest, but he immediately cut her off. “I’ll get the music from Byleth. Meet me here tomorrow at six so we can work on this shit.” 

“Six. Okay. Hand me your phone?” Annette said, holding out her hand in wait. She pinned her water bottle between her thighs, and pulled her own from the side pocket of her dance bag. 

  
Felix looked down at her iPhone, which was covered in a white phone case with a corgi butt emblazoned with the word “thicc” in large letters on the back. He tried his hardest to hold back a smile, but it was so stupid that he couldn’t help but chuckle.

“What? I got it on Wish. Look, if were going to meet up outside of official rehearsal, I need your number.” She held out her hand once more.

“What? Right.” Felix slipped his plain-black-Otterbox covered Android into her hand, their fingers brushing ever so slightly. 

They both looked up at each other for the briefest moment, as if they hadn’t just spent three hours doing lifts and turns and touching each other’s sweat-covered bodies. He was struck by just how blue her eyes were. While they were dancing, he hadn’t paid much attention. He thought maybe they were gray, but up in the light of the hallway they looked almost like a stormy sea. 

_Stormy sea._ That sounded like something Sylvain would say while trying to pick up _corps_ dancers. It made Felix want to gag. 

He punched his number into Annette’s phone anyway, trying to push back that stupid thought, then got his back from her. She had entered herself as “Annette _sunglasses emoji_ Dominic” which was both sickeningly adorable and absolutely ridiculous. 

“I guess I’ll see you at six, then,” Annette said. She gave him a small wave, and before Felix knew it, she was already halfway to the women’s dressing room.

—

“Hey Mercie?” Annette asked as she plopped down on her friend’s overstuffed couch, a similarly overstuffed bowl of popcorn in her arms. Kernels went flying left and right, but neither woman seemed to care too much. After all, Mercedes was one of the few people that knew how to put up with Annette “Dumpster Fire” Dominic. 

“Yeah, Annie?” Mercedes, ignoring the stray popcorn, yanked a plush blanket over both of their laps. “Is something wrong?” 

Annette looked down into the bowl, her eyes sweeping over the microwave popcorn that she somehow managed not to burn for once. “Does Felix like, hate everyone? Or is it just me?”

“What did he do?” Mercedes asked. She grabbed the bowl of popcorn from Annette’s lap and placed it gently on the coffee table, before pulling her friend into a vanilla-scented hug. 

“He just—” Annette shrugged. “He was really rude to me. He kept complaining to Byleth about how he didn’t want to work with me, and he said I can’t _glissade_ for shit and—”

“Well, that’s where he’s wrong. I know for a fact that you _can_ in fact _glissade_ for shit.” Mercie smiled. 

Annette cracked a small smile. “Thanks. I just, I don’t know. We have no chemistry. I bet Byleth is regretting even letting me into the company.

“Annie! That’s not true. You’re a beautiful dancer! You work harder than anyone I know. In fact, that’s why I think you and Felix could get along if you got to know each other.” Mercedes freed Annette from the hug and grabbed her hands. Their eyes met, and for a moment, Annette felt all her worries fall away. “Felix is a hard worker too. Just show him that you’re serious about this.”

“Why do you always have to be right?”

Mercedes grinned. “Because I am. Now, _Tangled_ time!” 

—

Felix ran his fingers through his shampoo-slicked hair, poking and prodding at his scalp until he was confident that it was clean enough after a long day of dancing. He reached for the bottle of conditioner, but his hand stopped just short. 

Normally he didn’t feel like this during the lead up to the Spring charity showcase. No, this was easy, the baby steps before auditions for the Summer show. They would be performing _L'histoire de Manon_ this year, and he was so close to landing the part of des Grieux that he could taste it. _That_ was what should have been stressing him out, not this. 

But it was obvious that their dance didn’t work, and he was almost certain that it was his fault. He trusted Byleth and her judgement, so why couldn’t he make the _pas de deux_ look good? It ate him up inside, pulling at every little insecurity locked in his chest. If he couldn’t do well at a stupid charity showcase, how would he get the lead in _Manon_? How would he beat Dimitri, or ever be as good as—

Felix slid to the floor of the bath and put his head in his hands as the water beat down on his sinewed back. It had been over a year since the accident, yet just thinking about Glenn still made all the air rush from Felix’s lungs. He had always wanted to show that he could beat Glenn, could do better than Dimitri, but this wasn’t the way that he ever wanted to do it. He was supposed to pass them on his own merit and hard work, not because a drunk killed one and nearly crippled another. 

He grabbed at the conditioner again, though he still felt like he might throw up, and ran a dollop through his deep blue locks. Sylvain always made fun of him for using conditioner, but dammit. He wasn’t going to let his hair be a dry, frizzy mess. Nor was he going to let himself have a panic attack in the tub. 

The towel was halfway wrapped around his body when his phone started buzzing, Sylvain’s name flashing on the screen. 

“Speak of the devil…” Felix grumbled before flipping the phone onto speaker. “What do you want?”

“Hey, Fe. A couple of us were heading out to Zanado’s. You wanna meet us?” Sylvain asked. “I’ll buy you a beer.”

Even if Felix hadn’t felt like he was going to implode, he would rather gargle nails than get dragged to Zanado’s to be Sylvain’s wingman, _again._

“Sorry,” he sighed. “I’m meeting Annette at six to work on our piece. I need sleep.”

“At eight at night?” 

“Sylvain.”

“ _Fiiine_ ,” Sylvain conceded. “But you’re coming next time we go out. Promise?”

“Bye, Sylvain.” Felix hung up his phone, plugged it in, then flopped face first and naked onto his bed. 

He closed his eyes for the briefest moment, but cracked them back open when his phone started buzzing again. Anticipating Sylvain bitching at him for hanging up, he prepared to ignore the call. Instead, he found a string of texts from Annette _sunglasses emoji_.

**Annette:** Just checking, we’re still on for six tomorrow?

**Annette:** Like, 6 AM? I just want to make sure you didn’t mean 6 PM and then I show up in the morning like a dodo.

**Annette:** I’m probably overthinking this, but I just really want us not to suck!

**Annette:** Not that we suck. Or that you suck. You’re a really good dancer!!

Felix scrolled through the texts, the tension in his chest easing into half-laughter instead. Despite their crap time in the studio, it seemed like she actually wanted to work on this, which eased some of the anxiety. Maybe they could make it work.

**Felix:** Yeah, 6 AM.

Before he knew it, his fingers were moving on their own, typing out another text.

**Felix:** For what it’s worth, you don’t suck either.

He hit send, then stared at his phone for longer than he was comfortable admitting, watching as the triple dots waited at the bottom of the screen. A moment later, it was flooded by a bunch of thumbs up emojis, followed by another text.

**Annette:** Thanks! Can’t wait to see you tomorrow!

Felix didn’t respond, instead flopping his head face first into the pillows. He knew he should sleep, but instead he found himself getting ready to practice again.

—

Annette stood in front of the studio door, trying to figure out how she was going get it open with two drinks and a bag of bagels in her hands. She knew she should have said yes when they asked her if she wanted a drink holder, but she had stupidly thought that it would be fine, because it was two drinks and she had two hands, so nothing would go wrong. 

Now that she was there, however, things were already starting to go _very_ wrong. She tried to adjust the strawberry creme frappuccino in her hand in order to grab the handle, but it nearly slipped, and when she tried to correct herself, it made some of the cold brew she got for Felix spill onto her hand. 

“At least it’s not hot coffee…” she mumbled to herself. “Hot coffee, hot and fresh~”

“Good morning.” 

The sudden voice made her jump, nearly spilling both drinks all over herself. Felix stood behind her, his hair pulled back and his eyes rimmed with dark circles. She felt kind of bad for him, like her incompetence was the reason that he was missing out on delicious morning sleep. 

“I brought coffee? And bagels?” she said as she stepped inside, holding them up for emphasis. “I wasn’t sure what you would want, but you didn’t really seem like a latte guy? I got you a cold brew? Without milk or sugar. I didn’t want to get you milk if you were lactose intolerant or—”

“Annette,” he cut her off. “Cold brew is fine. I don’t really like sweets.” 

Felix took the cup from her hand, then pulled open the door. He motioned for her to go through, then followed her inside. From the size of the bag in her hands, it seemed like she nearly got one of every type of bagel, again probably because she was worried she’d offend him. It was kind of cute, in a crazy kind of way. 

“Oh, good. I um. I figured that whatever bagels we didn’t want, we could leave in the kitchenette for people to pick at?” She shrugged. “I tend to go for pumpernickel, but if that’s the one you want then I’m fine with whatever,” she said. 

“Did you get any blueberry?” Felix asked, peering over her shoulder as she set the bag down on the counter. 

Annette sucked in a breath, trying to keep super still so that she wouldn’t accidentally brush into Felix and knock them both over. Her heart and thoughts were racing, even though she knew that she _shouldn’t_ be scared of him. After all, Mercie was right! She _could_ in fact _glissade_ for shit. She could _glissade_ and _pirouette_ and do _fouettés_ until she was blue in the face. 

_Don’t be scared of him, don’t be scared of him_. The mantra repeated over and over in her head as she turned to face him, now trapped between him and the counter, their bodies so close that she could feel his heat through his athletic t-shirt. 

“W-who do you take me for?” she stammered. “Of course I got blueberry!” 

He leaned over her to reach in the bag, and she was overwhelmed by the soft, pine-woodsy scent of his cologne. _Don’t be scared, don’t be scared._

Annette watched as Felix buttered his bagel, taking his time to avoid getting crumbs in the container. Despite his gruff exterior, if he could do that one thing, maybe he wasn’t all bad? 

“So, um. About the _pas de deux_?” She stared down at her pumpernickel bagel, the cream cheese oozing out of the seams in a way that made her mouth just water. 

“What about it?” Felix asked. He grabbed his coffee again and took another long sip—only to find that what he had taken was _not_ in fact his drink. The cloying taste of too-sweet fake strawberry crap filled his mouth, making him nearly retch. “Fuck, how do you drink that shit?” 

“Drink wh—” Annette turned around to see Felix, her strawberry creme frapp in hand, wincing like he had just licked the inside of a trash can. She stared at him for a long moment, then burst into deep, chest-aching laughter. “You aren’t sick, are you?”

“No?” 

“Good.” Annette took the frappucino back from Felix’s hand. “Next time I’ll get you your own.” 

“Please don’t.” 

“A trenta, even!” 

“What in the _fuck_ is a trenta?” Felix’s face curled up in confusion and disgust, trying and failing to figure out what that pink nightmare would even look like.

“Thirty-one ounces of strawberry creme goodness, Felix. All for you.” She smiled, and Felix felt his heart burst in his chest. 

_Fuck._

“I’ll pass. Thanks for the coffee, though.” Felix looked away, staring down his barely touched bagel. He couldn’t look at her, not right now. How had he not noticed how cute her smile was the day before? 

He ran his palm down his face. This was stupid. He was just tired. After all, he was up half the damn night after his near-panic attack trying to perfect his steps before that morning’s practice. His muscles still vaguely ached, and if Sylvain or Ingrid saw him like this they would scold the shit out of him. After all, he had come this far. Why risk it all with a stupid, preventable injury? 

“Felix?” Annette tapped him on the shoulder. “You okay?” 

“Yeah. Fine. You ready?”

Annette smiled. “As I’ll ever be.” 

—

Warmups were already tense, but the moment that Felix started the music for their piece, Annette thought she was going to throw up. While breakfast made her way more comfortable with him than she had been the day before, there was still a seed of anxiety brewing in her belly, the little voice that told her that she wasn’t good enough, that she’d never been good enough. 

As much as she wanted to be here in Garreg Mach, dancing in the legendary Serios Ballet, she wasn’t wholly there to dance and she knew it. When Mercie told her that they were holding auditions, and that she’d put in a good word for her, Annette’s heart didn’t leap because this would further her dancing career. She wasn’t excited because she’d get to live with her best friend. No, she wanted this chance for a different reason entirely, and now that distraction was costing her.

“Annette!” Felix snapped as he wiped a stubborn sweat-slicked lock of hair off of his forehead. “What the fuck was that?” 

Gone was the laughing, strawberry-sucking Felix from breakfast. Now he was back in Serious Dancer Mode and if he yelled at her one more time, she was sure she was going to break down in tears right there and then. 

“A _grand jeté?_ ” Annette shrugged. 

“There was nothing _grand_ about that _jeté.”_ Felix marched over to the bench, grabbed his water bottle, and chugged until he felt less like ripping his hair out straight from the root.

“Oh, so I’m the problem? _Hi, I’m Felix and I can’t look interested to save my life!_ You’re supposed to be seducing me! You look like you’re being forced to eat Grape Nuts!”

She sauntered over to him and poked him square in the chest, her delicate face curled up with frustration. It surprised her how muscular he felt just under that one jab, not that she was going to think about that when she was _angry._

“I don’t exactly go around _seducing_ people.” Felix tried to weasel out of poking range, but when he took a step back, she took a step forward. He opened his mouth to say something else, but the studio door flew open.

“Seducing people? Then you called the right person.” 

Annette could only describe the look on Felix’s face as _having smelled sour milk_.

“Sylvain. We have the room for another fifteen minutes,” Felix snapped. 

“You do, which is why I wanted to drop in. After all, you didn’t go to Zanado’s last night. I missed you!” Sylvain chided. Mercedes followed a moment behind him, already ready to work on their piece. 

Felix narrowed his eyes on Sylvain, the frustration growing so much that he was sure he was going to explode. “Fifteen. Minutes.” 

Mercedes waived to Annette, but took a seat next to Sylvain. She figured that her friend must be dancing with him, which made her vaguely nervous. After all, the redhead’s reputation preceded him. 

They were running out of time, but their _pas de deux_ was no better than yesterday. It was still clunky, flat, _boring._ Hell, she was sure she couldn’t draw people’s interest even if she set the stage on fire again. This had never happened to her before. She didn’t know how to fix it. Yes, that was what Byleth was for during their actual rehearsals, but getting another perspective couldn’t hurt?

“We could run through it one more time?” Annette asked. 

“I’d love to see it!” Mercedes pulled her legs up on the bench, her face warmed with an ear-to-ear smile. Just seeing her calmed Annette’s nerves, though it seemed that Sylvain’s presence had the opposite effect on Felix.

Felix groaned. “Fine. Play the music.” 

The score started off soft, flittering. It was a blend of violin and flute with pitter-patter drums, to echo Annette’s ode to daylight. She stepped out onto the floor, gliding through each _glissade_ , keeping intense balance through the turns. She felt confident and beautiful and graceful— but that was when the music changed. 

Gone were the soft, breezy notes of daytime, now growing lower and darker as the night encroached. That was when Felix sauntered in, his movements strong and bestial. He was supposed to find her, pull her, seduce her. After all, dusk was supposedly the melding of the night and day. But again, there was Felix’s Grape-Nut face, looking at her like he wanted nothing to do with her. He seemed too focused on his steps, on making sure that his performance was technically perfect, that it lost the artistry. 

The music rose to a crescendo, and so came the lift. Annette was supposed to extend in his arms, poised like she was enthralled by his touch, but all she could think about was how stiff this was, how _fake._ He released her from the lift as she spun around in a complicated series of turns and jumps, which then synchronized with his steps. Or, they were supposed to if Felix wasn’t a beat ahead of her.

The dance was supposed to end in a passionate embrace, but how the hell was she supposed to slide down his body? To cup his face, to succumb to his seduction when all she could think about was that he couldn’t give two shits about whether or not she was there?

When the music ended, Annette sunk to the ground, her head in her hands. “Tell me how terrible it was, Mercie.” 

“It wasn’t _terrible_ ,” Mercedes shrugged, though the strain in her eyes told them otherwise. 

“You two just need to bone.” Everyone turned to Sylvain, who reflexively shot up his arms. “I mean, it’s supposed to be a sexy piece? And both of you look rather unsexy.”

Annette huffed, throwing her arms in the air. “I am _plenty_ sexy, thank you!”

“I’m not _boning_ anyone either.” Felix pinched the bridge of his nose. “There has to be a way to get this shit train back on track.”

Mercedes, who had been especially quiet since she entered, cracked a large grin. “Maybe you just need to spend more time together?” 

  
“Yeah!” Sylvain clapped Mercedes on the back, which made her face fall into something that Annette could only describe as _please-dear-Goddess-someone-help-me_. “You two should go on a date!”


	2. Will Twinkle Forever Like a Star

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annette tries to cheer Felix up after a bad night out, but her klutziness prevails.

“I fucking hate you, you know that?” Felix mumbled as he looked down into his glass of beer. “Couldn’t you keep your mouth shut for once?”

Sylvain waggled his eyebrows. “You’ll thank me when this is all over. Trust me, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I let you suck all over the stage.”

“It couldn’t have been that bad. Felix is ah-mazing.” Dorothea took a sip of her vodka cranberry, then slid up close to Sylvain in the booth. 

Somehow, Felix had been dragged to Zanado’s when he _should_ have been rehearsing. Sure, Sylvain had delivered on the beer that he promised, but just the few sips that Felix had made him feel nearly nauseous. There was no point being out, fooling around, listening to his friends make jabs at his performance.

“No, Do. It was indeed _that bad._ The dancing is fine, but they have no chemistry,” Sylvain explained. “I told them that they needed to bone.”

“That’s it. I’m out.” Felix stood up, but before he could step out of the booth Dorothea grabbed his wrist.

“Fe, no!” she whined. Felix rolled his eyes, but did manage to sit back down. “Maybe Sylvain is going a little far, but if chemistry is the problem, then you just have to get to know her!” 

Felix had to admit, that didn’t sound wholly terrible. It wasn’t like he hated her or her dancing. He just wasn’t used to her yet. He’s known the other female dancers in the company for years, and danced with most of them at some point or another. Maybe that _was_ the secret, as much as he didn’t want to admit it. 

“Fine,” Felix sighed into his beer. “But I’m not going on a date with her.”

“Oh, you should invite her out! Text her, Fe.”

“I’m not—”

“She’s rooming with Mercie right now. I’ll text her,” Sylvain’s lips curled into the most shit-eating grin Felix had ever seen. If he wasn’t in the business of trying to keep his hands unbroken, he definitely would have considered punching him in the face.

“Sylvai—”

“Felix.” Sylvain put his phone down on the table and stared his friend down with intense brown eyes. “It’s not a fucking date. It’s a few drinks with a few friends, and maybe you can loosen up for two goddamn minutes.” 

“Fuck you,” Felix spat. He locked eyes with Sylvain, then chugged the remained of his beer. Once it was empty, he slammed the glass against the table. “There. I’m having fun.”

The air between the three was so tense that it could be cut with a particularly sharp _rond de jambe_. Felix rose from the booth once more, turning towards the bar. “I’m getting another drink.”

He didn’t particularly want or need another drink, but it got him away from the table for just long enough to catch his breath. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to spend any time with Annette, it was just that he didn’t really want to spend time with _anyone_ outside of the studio. He didn’t have enough time for him to just waste it, not when he had so much to live up to. 

Felix grabbed his beer and walked back towards the booth, pausing when he heard Sylvain’s voice above the roar of the crowd.

“I wish he would get the stick out of his ass, you know. He hasn’t done anything but dance since Glenn— Ow!” Sylvain was cut off by Dorothea jabbing her elbow into his ribs. It was too late, however, and the damage done.

“Fuck you, Sylvain.” Felix slammed his beer down on the table, not caring as it splashed over the rim of the glass. He stormed off, weaving between bodies as he tried to make his way to the exit. It felt like the air was slowly being squeezed from his lungs, like the room was collapsing in around him. 

While the last thing that Felix wanted was for Glenn’s memory to fall from the minds of those who loved him, he also didn’t want his brother to be blamed for his own shortcomings. It wasn’t Glenn’s fault that Felix didn’t go out, wasn’t Glenn’s fault that he practiced until his body screamed for him to stop. Glenn didn’t teach Felix to do that, no. That was his own damn fault.

Felix continued to wander towards the exit, not stopping until he thumped up against another warm body. 

“Felix?” Annette asked. “Sorry for running into you like that. Um, are you leaving?” 

“Yeah. Something came up.” 

Annette wasn’t stupid, not by a longshot. She spent enough time with the woman who called herself the ultimate mom friend, so she knew the signs of someone who was hiding something. He wasn’t leaving because of an emergency, no. There was that slight glint of sweat on his forehead, the wideness of his amber eyes. It was a look that she recognized, mostly because it was one that she was all-too-familiar with.

“Are you okay?” She reached out her hand, her fingers barely brushing against his bare forearm, but he pulled away. 

His eyes lingered on hers for a moment longer than they should have. She didn’t look at him the way that the others did, like they were still walking on eggshells around him. But Annette? Fuck he had yelled at her during three separate rehearsals and she still had the compassion to ask him if he was _okay._

_Fuck it._

“No,” he sighed. “I’m not.”

Annette pulled her phone from her purse, her thumbs flying across the screen. “I’m just letting Mercie know that I’m taking you home. Have you eaten yet?”

“Whoa!” Felix held his hands up, as if that would slow down the firecracker that was Annette. “I never said you were taking me home.” 

“Friends don’t let friends go off when they’re not okay. Again, have you eaten?” 

Felix crossed his arms over his chest and gave her the side eye. “No, I haven’t.”

“Well, then. Guess you’re coming to my place for dinner!” Annette grabbed his hand, her soft, slender fingers tangling through his as she tugged him down the sidewalk. 

His heart skipped a beat, his lungs tightening until it felt like all the air would slip away from them. She spent hours today in his arms, sliding down his body, yet _this_ was the touch that seared his skin. 

_Fuck_ , it was going to be a long night.

—

“Can you hand me that onion?” Annette asked, pointing with the large chef’s knife in her hand. She turned so fast that the blade nearly grazed Felix’s arm, causing him to spring back to avoid injury.

“Watch it!” he warned, though she barely noticed. That was the problem with Annette. She could be so damn oblivious that Felix wondered how she managed to make it to adulthood without accidentally walking into traffic. Then again, she somehow had so much dumb luck that even if she did, he was certain all the cars would magically avoid her. 

“Chili, chili, chili, I made it out of meat…” Annette sang as she drizzled a bit of oil into the bottom of her large, red enameled pot. She then turned back to the cutting board so that she could start dissecting the onion Felix had picked out. 

“Are you singing the dreidel song, but about chili?”

“Yeah? I like to sing when I do things. It helps me focus.” She shrugged.

“And how does the rest of it go? You made it out of meat?”

Annette grinned. For the briefest moment, it felt like Felix’s heart had stopped in his chest. He wanted to chalk it up to the anxiety, but… No, this felt like something different.

“Chili, chili, chili, I made it out of meat. And when it’s hot and ready, then chili I will—”

She cut herself off with a noise that was a cross between a scream and an eek, and for good reason. They both turned towards the stovetop, watching in horror as the pot burst into flames.

Felix lept into action, hoping to quell the blaze before it set off the fire alarm, and then the fire _sprinklers._

“Where’s the lid?” he asked. His eyes scanned the counter, trying to find anything that could smother the flames.

“Here!” She raced towards him, heavy lid in hand, and slammed it down on top of the burning pot. 

The next few seconds felt like they took hours to pass, but when Felix lifted the lid again, the only thing that remained was a set of scorch marks. He turned to Annette, a heavy sigh leaving his lungs.

“So, should we order Chinese?” 

—

“So…” Annette began as she fumbled with a particularly fiddly piece of orange chicken. “Do you want to talk?”

Felix slurped up a string of lo mein straight from the takeout container, avoiding Annette’s storm-blue eyes. “Talk about what?” 

“Why you left the bar? Are you a talky person? You don’t seem like it, but I’m a good listener.” She placed her chopsticks across her carton of steamed rice, taking a moment to stare at her bitten nails. 

_Fuck_. 

There was no way that he could talk to Annette about what had happened the year before, about Glenn, about Dimitri, about how his life had shattered into pieces while he was left alone to pick them up. He couldn’t even lean on his father, who seemed to only give a shit about how Dimitri felt. Everything was fucked up, and he was the only one he could rely on.

“Or… We could talk about something else? Or watch something, maybe?” She grabbed her chopsticks once more and began prodding at her food. All she could think about was how royally she must have messed up. Felix wouldn’t want to talk to her about the weather, let alone his _feelings_. At this point, she wasn’t even sure why she had invited him over in the first place. Why was she such a disaster?

“It’s not a big deal,” Felix lied. “Sylvain just said something that pissed me off.”

“It wasn’t about me, was it?” Annette chewed on her bottom lip. She was trying _very_ hard not to look Felix in the eye, not when she was treading on a mountain of eggshells. “Because, if it was, I’m really sorry I’m making us suck.”

Felix nearly choked on a bite of kung pao chicken, sending spicy spicy sauce straight into his windpipe. His eyes watered as he coughed and scrambled to grab his water glass. Annette sprang forward, but only managed to knock the cup straight out of his hands and into the air. It seemingly somersaulted, turning end on end, until it crashed straight on Felix’s lap.

Her hands clapped over her mouth in complete and utter shock. A muffled squeak managed to find its way through her fingers as she stared at him with wide blue eyes. 

“I am so. _Fucking._ Sorry!” Annette rushed to her feet to get him a towel, darting out of the room before Felix could even react.

_As if this night couldn’t get any fucking worse._

If he were Sylvain, he’d make some stupid joke about how he was supposed to be the one getting her wet. But, he wasn’t Sylvain, and just the fact that he _thought_ that made Felix want to puke. 

The wet turtleneck clung uncomfortably against his skin, which only added to the general aura of _ick_ that he was feeling at that moment. He grabbed the back of the collar, and yanked it over his head.

“I managed to find— Felix!” Annette stopped in her tracks, watching as Felix pulled his shirt off in front of her right there in the middle of her living room. Sure, she had spent hours dancing with him. Hell, a large part of their dance required for her to run her hands over those specific muscles, but he always wore _clothes_ during rehearsal. 

And _shit_. He looked even better than she had imagined. Not that she had imagined him shirtless. For long. 

“What? I figured we could throw it in the dryer.” He closed the gap between him and Annette, taking the towel from her near-shaking hands. 

“You can’t just _take your shirt off_ without warning!” she yelled. 

Felix rolled his eyes and started to pull the wet sweater _back_ on.

“Wait, no! It’s wet.”

“Annette,” Felix sighed. “You’re giving me _really_ mixed signals here.”

—

“I’m really glad this wasn’t actually a date,” Annette said as she threw herself back down on the couch. Felix’s sweater was safely in the dryer, and he was currently wearing an oversized (even for him) pink t-shirt with the words _“Show me your kitties”_ emblazoned on the front. He insisted that he would be fine without it, but there was no way that she would be able to survive sharing a couch with him if he were still half naked.

She blushed. “Not that going on a date with you would be bad. I mean, you’re perfectly date-able.” 

“Annette.”

“It’s just that I’m a disaster and _this,”_ she gesticulated wildly, nearly hitting him in the nose, “was a disaster. I’m saying that if we actually went on a real date, I wouldn’t nearly set the house on fire.” 

“Right. I’ll keep that in mind,” he said. 

Annette grabbed the remote, then pulled a fluffy pink blanket from a bin next to the couch. She spread it over her legs, taking her time trying to brush out every kink and maximize coziness. 

It was such a different side of her than what she showed at the studio. Her hair was thrown up in a messy bun her eyeliner was still a little smudged from the commotion after the fire, but just looking at her made Felix’s chest tighten. 

_Stupid._ He could barely dance with her. There was no way in any reality that he could _date_ her. Especially not when she nearly burned the house down just trying to cook dinner. 

“You aren’t making us suck, by the way,” Felix said. Annette looked up from searching the Netflix menu. She placed the remote back down on her lap and shrugged.

“You’re the one that said there was nothing grand about my _jeté_.”

“I lied, okay. I’m the one who’s being an asshole.” Felix pushed a chunk of dark blue hair off of his face, trying his hardest to not screw this up. The last thing he needed was to see Annette nearly cry again tonight. _Fuck_ , he didn’t need to cry either. “If we want to do this, we need to figure this out.” 

“Well,” Annette shrugged. “We’ll start here. Great British Bake Off always calms me down when I feel bad. But we’ll have to watch an older season, or Mercie will kill me for watching without her.” 

Felix wasn’t about to tell her that he didn’t care for sweets, or for cooking shows. After all, if he was going to mend the fence between them, he would have to meet her halfway. So, Great British Bake Off it was. 

—

Felix awoke to the sound of the front door opening. Somehow, during their marathon of The Great British Bake Off, he had ended up underneath the blanket with Annette and asleep. Her head was resting on his shoulder, a lock of bright orange hair so close to his nose that he could sneeze. 

The TV was still on, but stuck on the _Are you still watching?_ Screen, which let him know approximately how long they must have been out. Before he could wake Annette, however, the living room light flicked on, revealing Mercedes.

“Oh, Felix. You’re still here!” Mercedes said.

“Shh!” Felix whispered, trying to signal that Annette was still asleep without jolting her awake. 

“Oh, no, this happens all the time. It’s terrible for her back, though.” Mercedes’ eyes flicked down to the shirt Felix was forced to wear and barely held back a snicker. She placed her hand on the sleeping girl’s shoulder, and gently rocked her. “Annie, wake up.”

Felix pulled back from her slightly, lest she jolt upwards and accidentally headbutt him in the nose. 

“Five more minutes…” Annette mumbled. As she blinked awake, the room grew clearer. There was Mercie, still in her clothes from the bar, and Felix under the blanket with her. 

_Felix._ Under the _blanket_ . With _her_ . Where she was _asleep._ On the _couch._

“WellFelixitwasnicetoseeyougoodtalkingseeyoutomorrow, _bye!”_ Annette sprang up from the couch and sprinted to the dryer, practically throwing open the lid to get Felix’s sweater out. She tossed it like it was radioactive, then bolted back into her room.

“Is she always like that?” Felix asked, an eyebrow quirked. 

Mercedes gave him a warm smile. “Yes, I suppose so.”

—

When Felix finally made it home, it was nearly two in the morning. His whole body was creaky and stiff, half from the couch, and half from his near endless practicing. Despite the fatigue that loomed heavy in his bones, he half thought about ending his night at the barre, perfecting his form until the sun rose once more.

The only thing that stopped him was remembering that he was supposed to meet Annette at the studio bright and early again. He’d be worthless without any sleep. Well, even more worthless than he already was with her. 

He stripped his now-dry turtleneck off and tossed it in the bin, then collapsed on his bed. Despite the fact that it was larger, and less back-breaking than Annette’s couch, it somehow felt lonelier, more _empty._ He tossed a pillow over his head in a vain attempt to drown out his spiraling thoughts, but immediately tossed it away the second his phone buzzed.

**Annette:** Sorry about tonight. I enjoyed spending time with you, and I hope you feel better!

**Annette:** See you in the morning! :D

It was times like these where he needed Sylvain to take his phone and just reply for him, because there was no way that he could navigate this situation without making an ass of himself. It still amazed him that Annette even wanted to talk to him, let alone text him to _make sure he was okay._ He typed and deleted a response over and over again, before finally settling on a response.

**Felix:** Coffee’s on me tomorrow.

It was quiet for a moment, before his phone buzzed once more. Annette had responded, this time only with a singular red heart emoji.

  
 _Fuck_ , he was never going to sleep again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ho boy, friends. 
> 
> Thank you for the lovely comments. I'm glad that this can help some of y'all take your mind off things for a moment while the whole world is imploding.
> 
> I've been writing this between playing animal crossing and staring at craft shit I want to buy. (And working, I guess, but this working from home thing has really turned into "I'm gonna play animal crossing for nine hours a day and get paid for it.") 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this update, I'll try to have another one soon. It's been a long time since I've written a longfic, so hopefully I don't fuck it up, right?


	3. Overflowing with Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sylvain tries to help fix the pas de deux, with mixed results.

**Felix:** Sylvain.

**Sylvain:** So, you’re finally coming to me for help?

**Felix:** No.

**Felix:** Yes. 

**Felix:** Fuck you.

**Sylvain:** ;)

Felix stood by the Starbucks counter waiting for his coffee order, staring down at his phone. He felt almost dirty asking Sylvain of all people for help on this matter, but he was out of options. It was clear that his own shortcomings were what was dooming the  _ pas de deux,  _ and if he knew anyone who could fix his Grape Nuts face, it would be Sylvain Jose Gautier. 

**Sylvain:** Is this dance advice, or ~Love~ advice?

This was a bad idea. The regret sunk in almost immediately, especially since Felix was still  _ pissed _ at Sylvain about his comment last night. He wished that everyone would stop trying to make him go back to normal. His brother was  _ dead _ . Normal was long fucking gone. 

**Felix:** Both? Tell me how to fix this fucking pas de deux.

**Sylvain:** You going in early again?

**Felix:** Yeah. 

**Sylvain:** On my way!

Felix looked up to see the barista slide two drinks onto the counter, one a cold brew, the other a monstrous pink abomination approximately the size of a loaf of bread. He had clearly underestimated how large thirty-one ounces of strawberry creme frappuccino actually was. Annette would love it. He slipped his phone back into his pocket and grabbed the drinks, before making his way to the studio.

—

Annette’s eyes widened when Felix entered with the toddler-sized frapp. “That is  _ huge _ .” 

“That’s what she said!” Sylvain popped into the kitchenette, his dance bag slung effortlessly over his shoulder. If Felix hadn’t already felt regret for inviting Sylvain for help, he sure was feeling it now. 

“Morning, Sylvain.” Annette took a sip of her drink. She paused for a moment, holding the cup up to show what the barista had written on it. “And Fenis.”

“Fenis?” Felix frowned. “You two are going to call me that all fucking day now, aren’t you?”

“No!”

“Absolutely.”

Felix glared at Sylvain, who was somehow still beaming even though Felix looked as if he would punch his friend square in the dick. It was going to be a  _ long _ fucking day, and he was almost  _ glad _ that he hadn’t stayed up all night to rehearse.

The three made it into the studio, taking their time to warm up. Normally, this was one of Felix’s favorite parts of the day. He felt at ease at the barre, going through the motions to stretch and prep his muscles for another hard day of dancing. 

This time, however, his focus kept slipping away from him. First position,  _ plié _ — his gaze wandered over to Annette. Her movements were so fluid, so elegant, that he barely recognized her as the girl who nearly set her kitchen on fire and doused him with water the night before. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her, watching intently as she moved.

For a moment, he could only think of the way that she felt sleeping on him on the couch, the way that the scent of her shampoo tickled his nose. That fucking heart emoji that she sent him after he said that he’d be bringing coffee. He didn’t know what this feeling was, but he did not, under any circumstances, like the way that it obsessed his every thought.

“Fenis!” Sylvain snapped. “Focus!” 

Annette giggled from her spot at the barre. She may have said that she wouldn’t call him by the stupid name, but it didn’t mean that she wouldn’t find it outrageously funny. Still, her dance partner seemed to be acting strangely since he got in. It made her stomach a little queasy, as it was probably her doing. 

After all, she had to be weird the night before and pry into his personal life, cause a cooking accident, soak him, and then fall asleep on him. If he never wanted to speak to her again, she’d completely understand. 

“I am focused!” Felix snapped. He lowered his leg and squared up to Sylvain, though the redhead was  _ much _ taller. “Fuck it. Let’s start.”

Sylvain looked to Annette and shrugged. “Fine with me.”

Felix connected his phone to the sound system and queued up their song, giving Annette ample time to get into position. He locked eyes with her and raised a brow. She nodded, indicating that she was indeed ready, and Felix hit play.

The soft violin started up, followed by the feather-light tune of Lysithea’s flute. Annette glided onto the floor, captivating Felix’s attention with her precise movements. She looked almost like a fairy, gracefully making her way through each step and twirl. Even while keeping the count in his head, he was so drawn in by her dancing that he nearly missed his cue. 

Felix dashed to Annette’s side, trying his hardest to not look bored. He reached for her hand, letting her fingers slip through his as she pulled away in a series of  _ fouettés _ . Then, he danced after her, preparing for the first lift—

“Stop!” Sylvain shouted. “Felix, for fuck’s sake. Why are you about as sexy as tapioca pudding right now?” 

Felix frowned. “Tapioca pudding?” 

“Hey, I think he’s sexier than that. Like, maybe vanilla pudding. He’s getting better?” Annette offered. 

“I’m definitely sexier than vanilla pudding.” Felix crossed his arms in a vain attempt to quell the anger and frustration building in his chest. 

“Normally, yes. Like, just plain-old-Felix? Very sexy.” Annette paused for a moment, her face going beet-red. “I mean. Not that I spend a lot of time determining how sexy you are. I just mean. When you dance with me, you aren’t being sexy.”

Sylvain cleared his throat and walked between the two. “If I may interject. Look, we’re all being pushed for this showcase. You two have never worked together. I’m supposed to look pure and angelic. Hilda actually has to do something for once. Byleth just wants us to be better dancers.”

Felix had to admit that Sylvain had a point, but that didn’t mean that he had to like it. He brushed a chunk of hair off of his sweat-sheen forehead and tried to focus again. 

“So, how do you suggest that we fix this?” Felix asked.

“Annette. Hands on his shoulders,” Sylvain guided her into the proper position. “Felix, hands on her waist. We’re doing this middle school slow dance style.” 

“I don’t know how this is going to help…” Annette mumbled, chewing the corner of her lip. 

“Just let him get through this, and then we’ll figure it out when he leaves.” Felix sighed. 

Sylvain clapped. “Okay, now, Felix. Tell Annette something you like about her.”

Felix stared down at Annette. There was a lot he could say about her, a lot of good things, really, but most of them made his stomach churn with embarrassment. He couldn’t tell her things like  _ “You have pretty eyes,”  _ or  _ “When you smile I feel like my chest is going to collapse.” _

That would imply that he had feelings for her, and there was no way he was going to even put a toe in that territory. First of all, dating in the same ballet company was a recipe for disaster, and second of all. The last time he dated  _ anyone _ was before Glenn had died. He wasn’t sure he even had it in his heart to love anyone anymore, not when they could be ripped away from him so suddenly.

Sylvain poked Felix’s cheek. “Earth to Fenis?” 

“Don’t call me that!” Felix snapped. “Fine. Annette. I like… I like your hair.”

Warmth spread through his cheeks, his mind wandering back to falling asleep with her on the couch, her hair tickling his nose. It smelled like flowers, and if he knew jack shit about any of them, he’d guess orange blossoms, because they’d compliment the color. He liked her hair, and he couldn’t even say that he hadn’t spent half the night thinking about touching it again. 

“Felix, you’re blushing,” Annette whispered.

“No, I’m not.”

“You—” she frowned. “You’re right. You’re not.”

“Okay! Now, Annette, tell Felix something you like about him.” Sylvain crossed his arms over his chest, looking like a particularly ridiculous kindergarten teacher.

“I like that you don’t think I’m stupid?” she blurted out, her face reddening as well. 

“Fuck it, this isn’t working either.” Sylvain covered his face with his hand. “Okay, Annette. You think you can dance with me for a bit?”

Felix immediately felt a pit form in his stomach. Sylvain? Dancing with Annette? Together? Sure, he didn’t own her, but he’d known Sylvain for years. Dancing led to dating led to fucking, and then him never calling her again because fuck other people’s feelings. 

“Yeah. That’s fine.” Annette made her way over to Sylvain, but Felix swore that she kept glimpsing over at him. Was she nervous? Trying to make him jealous? Taunting him for being unable to do something as simple as look at her like he desired her?

“Take it from where Felix enters. Fe, hit the music?” Sylvain winked.

That was it. Felix was going to punch him. Not really, but he thought about it. Still, he started the music, nodding his head to the beat as the two sprang into action. 

Annette began her turn sequence when Sylvain slunk in. The way he held himself was all different than how Felix danced. Sure, Sylvain’s technique wasn’t as up to snuff, but he had a better energy. When he grabbed for Annette, he looked at her like she was everything he ever wanted. 

When she slid down his chest, he dipped his mouth near hers, eyes half lidded, a cocky smirk on his face. He looked confident, like he already knew that he won. He  _ knew _ she would enter the kingdom of night with him, knew that he would end up dancing away with her. If Felix did this, Annette didn’t think she’d live to the end of the dance. She might just collapse in front of everyone. 

The music stopped, and Felix felt like he was going to be sick. 

Sylvain looked at his two pupils, observing the look of distress on both of their faces. “I think we’re done for right now.”

—

**Annette:** I think I have a problem.

**Annette:** I know I have a problem.

**Mercedes:** What’s wrong?

**Annette:** Meet you in the kitchen.

Annette stumbled through the house with a blanket wrapped around her head and upper body like some kind of very comfy Virgin Mary. It was late at night, so she knew that she had woken Mercie up, but there was no way that she could sleep like this.

“Annie? It’s two in the morning.” Mercedes wrapped her arm around her friend. “Is everything okay?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” Annette sighed. She put her head in her hands, unsure why she even dragged Mercedes into this. It wasn’t like Annette could form a coherent thought about the situation. 

“Do you need to talk about it? Or just talk?” Mercedes asked. It was the same kind of question that she had used on Felix the other night, after she rescued him from his near-panic attack at the bar. 

Annette pulled the blanket tighter around her body. She was there in the kitchen because she couldn’t sleep, and she couldn’t sleep because she kept thinking about  _ Felix. _ Her mind was a racing cinema of memories, of dancing with him, of watching him accidentally sip her drink, to him bringing her a giant frappuccino. Then her mind had wandered further. Felix on her couch without a shirt, falling asleep on him while watching Netflix… 

“I think I like Felix.” 

“Oh, really?” Mercedes smiled, and immediately Annette knew. Her best friend had figured this out  _ way _ before she had ever even noticed. But, she was going to humor her and not humiliate her. 

“I know that’s really stupid, considering we’ve only known each other for like, a week, and we’re dancing the showcase together, and—”

“Annie! Slow down.” She pulled Annette into a tight, warm-vanilla-sugar-scented hug. “It’s not stupid.”

Annette lifted her head. “It’s not?” 

“It’s not.”.

“But there’s like, no way he’d like me back? He’s like, I mean, have you seen him? And then there’s me.” Annette gestured vaguely at her torso. “And he  _ obviously _ doesn’t like me, considering that he can barely look at me when we dance!”

Deep down, she knew that wasn’t true. She had caught Felix sneaking glances at her enough times to  _ know _ that he didn’t hate her. He even bought her a trenta frappuccino based on a one-off comment for fuck’s sake. But that didn’t erase years of insecurities, of important people leaving her when she needed them most. 

“Have you considered that Felix might be as nervous as you are?” Mercedes asked. Her voice was still soft and sweet even though she was awake at two in the morning because her friend was having a romantic breakdown in the kitchen, even though she had to teach a pre-ballet class at eight. 

“I guess I never thought about it that way.” Annette sighed. “But I could never like, say that to him, you know?”

Mercedes frowned. “Say what?” 

“That I like him!” Annette collapsed on the island again, letting the cold granite sting the soft skin of her face. She knew full well that she was being ridiculous, that she should either just text him or go to bed and pretend like this had never happened. 

“Maybe there’s another way that you could phrase it?” Mercie yawned.

Annette sighed and stood from the stool. “You get some rest. If you hear screaming, that’s just me pining. It’s fine.”

“I’ll leave cookies.”

The girls returned to their rooms, leaving Annette to fall face first onto her bed. She grabbed her phone off of the nightstand and pulled up her texts, the two AM itch getting to her. It was almost like being drunk, even though she hadn’t had a drop to drink. No, she was just tired, and lonely, and stupid. So, so stupid.

**Annette:** I know it’s 2am but you want to get dinner tomorrow?

Now, she knew full well that Felix was probably asleep, and that she had an iPhone and Felix had an Android, so she wouldn’t get read receipts or see the dot dot dot from him typing, but she still felt like she was going to throw up. 

**Annette:** Like, not as a date, you know. Just dinner. Pasta?

**Annette:** Unless you want it to be a date?

She smacked the heel of her hand to her forehead, as if that would exorcise the stupidity straight from her skull. All it did, however, was make her head hurt. But just as she was about to plug her phone back in, it buzzed in return.

  
**Felix:** It’s a date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter chapter today, but I really wanted to get this out because we're all scared and stressed and bored and my shitty little ballet AU is helping me cope and maybe it's helping y'all cope?
> 
> Full disclosure, I'm a total moron and I spent way too long laughing at the Fenis bit. I still giggle every time I write it. I'm actually five years old. I'm sorry.
> 
> Today's installment of "Oh god, I'm really bi" comes in the form of the Hungry Eyes montage from Dirty Dancing. Yes, I watched it like, at least three times to try to figure out how to describe sexy face.
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MN9Khh_K2s Here's the link. You're welcome.
> 
> Also, due to the high traffic on AO3 at the moment, views from unregistered users aren't being counted. If you like this fic, give me a shot of dopamine straight to the brain box and leave a kudos, please.


	4. Born Sick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time for the pasta date, but what happens when a familiar face reopens old wounds?

_ It’s a date. _

Annette couldn’t get those three little words out of her head. It’s. A. Date. Did he mean that like it was a date date? Or did he just mean that he marked the date in the calendar? She had stayed up the rest of the night obsessing over his text, and it took every ounce of mental fortitude in her to not wake Mercie up again. 

A date. With Felix. Just thinking about it made her heart race like she just did a ton of coke and then ran a marathon. Of course, she didn’t want to get her hopes up in case it  _ wasn’t _ actually a date, but… Oh Goddess, she was going to faint.

Still, she had a particular pep in her step that she hadn’t possessed since coming to Garreg Mach. Annette danced around the kitchen as she prepared herself some breakfast, humming while putting a pair of Eggos in the toaster.

_ “Butter here, butter there, then we put jam everywhere…” _ Annette sung.

Mercedes entered the kitchen, already dressed for her class despite the fact that it wouldn’t start for several more hours. She sat down on one of the barstools by the island, watching as her friend danced. Before she could say anything, Annette was already at her side.

“Can you tell me what this means?” Annette slid her phone in front of Mercedes, the message chain with Felix clearly visible.

“Annie,” Mercie raised an eyebrow. “Please tell me you slept last night.”

“Of course I did!” Annette said, like a liar. “Now, you know Felix. Tell me if this is actually a date or if I’m absolutely reading this all wrong!” 

Mercedes grabbed the phone and squinted at it, making a big show of analyzing it. She then handed it back to Annette and smiled. 

“I think you and Felix will have a lovely time tonight.” 

—

**Sylvain:** You going in early today?

**Felix:** No. Hilda called in with “food poisoning”, so we’re doing a double with Byleth.

**Sylvain:** Hungover. Got it.

**Felix:** Why are you really texting me?

**Sylvain:** Who says I have an ulterior motive?

**Felix:** Sylvain.

**Sylvain:** I heard from Mercie that you and Annette were going on a date tonight.

**Felix:** You’re the one who said that we should.

**Sylvain:** I really hope you’re not taking her out just for the sake of the pas. 

**Sylvain:** Because everyone can tell that she has a thing for you. 

**Sylvain:** And that’d be fucked up.

**Felix:** Fuck you.

**Felix:** I like her.

**Sylvain:** Doro owes me ten bucks.

**Sylvain:** If you need condoms, let me know.

Felix shoved his phone into his pocket and walked into the studio, a frown on his face. He should have known that the gossip would travel fast, but he also didn’t really care who knew. It wasn’t like it was a big scandal, or an odd thing. They were dancing together. Showmances were a thing that happened. Not to him, but if he tried to count how many  _ corps de ballet _ girls Sylvain had slept with throughout the years, he’d run out of fingers and toes. 

It was just a date. A pasta date. With a girl who sang about making chili and breaking in her pointe shoes and her routine at the  _ barre _ . For fuck’s sake, he spent half of last Wednesday humming the goddamn  _ plié _ song. Why  _ shouldn’t _ he take her on a date? 

He liked her. He liked her, and saying that scared him. Felix knew full well how easy it was to lose someone. It was the reason he had kept everyone at arm’s length over the past year. Gone were the cast parties, the pizza nights with Sylvain, the made-up-on-the-spot choreography that came when everyone was exhausted and silly towards the end of a rehearsal. He couldn’t remember the last time he just casually texted someone other than Sylvain, and Felix only put up with him because they grew up together.

Felix sighed. Maybe he should cancel. Maybe he should back out before he hurt her. He grabbed his phone as he walked towards the men’s dressing room, but paused when he heard a familiar voice.  _ The goddamn plié song. _

From where he stood, Felix could see Annette through the observation window into the main studio room. Mercedes was standing next to her, and both women were in front of a class of about ten four year olds. He knew that Mercedes taught the pre-ballet classes, but he never stopped to think that maybe Annette would tag along. 

He watched as she demonstrated basic steps for the children, the easy stuff like first position, or how to  _ sauté. _ For a moment, he was brought back to when he was that age, when he and Glenn would practice their  _ grand jetés _ in the living room until they had to wash up for dinner. An even older memory echoed in the back of his head, one of his mother placing his hands on the  _ barre _ for the first time.

Annette popped her head out of the studio, snapping him out of his haze. She flashed him a warm smile and held out her hand. “People are going to think you’re a pervert if you just stand out there and stare. Come in, I’m helping Mercie today.” 

She dragged him into the studio, his hand in hers. During the course of their rehearsing, she had touched his hands hundreds of times. This time, however, it felt different. Touching him made her heart race and her cheeks redden. It wasn’t just business anymore, no. Now they had laid some of their cards out on the table. Hearts. Annette didn’t think that was how you played cards, but it was her metaphor and she was sticking with it.

“Everyone, this is Felix,” Mercedes introduced him to the class. “He’s working on a dance with Annie right now.”

“Can we see?” A girl with golden blonde hair asked. She reminded him a little bit of Ingrid, but Ingrid wouldn’t be caught dead in a tutu. No, while Felix, Sylvain, Glenn, and Dimitri all danced, she became the best damn light designer this side of Enbarr. 

“Yeah! You danced with Sylvain last week!” A little boy with green eyes shouted. 

Felix looked to Annette, who was pale as a ghost. It seemed like she had the same thought that he did, that they couldn’t subject these kids to the horror that was their uncharismatic  _ pas de deux _ . The only adult human in the room who didn’t seem to outwardly think this was a horrible idea was Mercedes, who was already queueing their music up on her phone.

“Mercie, do you think this is a good idea?” Annette asked. “I mean, the dance is kind of…” 

“Just cut it off before you get to the touchy part. To the first lift?” Mercedes shrugged. 

“The first lift is fine. Come on, ‘Nette.” Felix reached for her hand, his fingers brushing hers just like they did when she pulled him into the studio. Her touch filled him with a new kind of confidence, one that made him feel like he could tackle the dance that had been taunting him so. 

Annette threaded her fingers through his and gave his hand a quick squeeze. She was on board, ready to show the world just what she and Felix could do. 

They got into their places, and Mercie started up the music. This time, it felt like the violin was pulling a string inside of Annette, guiding her through the steps. She felt like sunlight, light as air and free. Every  _ jeté _ , every  _ sauté _ ; she was invincible.

When the music darkened, her heart fluttered in her chest. Just seeing Felix out of the corner of her eye, creeping closer, was enough to make her blush. The energy between them felt different, looser. He reached for her, and her fingers slipped just out of his grasp.

This was it, the first lift, where they’d be cutting off to keep the children from seeing Annette writhe all over Felix’s body. She had always loved being lifted. It made her feel like she was flying, like she was larger than life and lighter than air. His arm around her torso, her body balanced over his shoulder like she weighed nothing. 

He rolled her over in his arms as the music stopped, their faces only a hair away from each other. Normally here, Felix would have his sour, Grape-Nut look on, but today? His amber eyes bore into her blue, his breath coming out in soft spurts as he lowered her back down to Earth. 

“That was good?” Annette asked, her heart still pounding heavy in her chest. 

“Yeah.” Felix had to resist the urge to curse in front of a room full of four year olds, but goddammit did he feel good about this. It wasn’t the whole dance, but it was the best that they had done since they started. 

“Hm,” they heard Mercedes mumble, just below the volume of the children’s chatter. “Maybe Sylvain was right.” 

—

Rehearsal with Byleth went smoothly. While she still had a laundry list of critiques for the  _ pas _ , at least she hadn’t gone through the entire session looking like she made a horrible mistake by pairing the two. 

For the first time in weeks, Felix felt like he was on top of the world. For a moment, he felt like he could breathe, like Glenn’s ghost wasn’t constantly hovering over him, like he wasn’t left in Dimitri’s shadow. He couldn’t remember the last time that he genuinely smiled. 

Maybe it all  _ was _ thanks to Annette.

Felix pulled up in front of the little house that Annette and Mercedes lived in. For a moment he considered just texting her to let her know that he was outside, but he decided that was far too impersonal. He parked tight to the curb, then walked up the stepping stones to make it to the front door. The entire yard was decorated with flowers and various little knick knacks, creating a path up to the yellow house. 

Felix paused on the porch, his hand nearly touching the apple-green door, while he collected himself. He knew there was no reason to be nervous. Annette was the one that asked him on the date. She liked him. He liked her. 

And if they could dance together for multiple hours a day, there was little chance that the date would be so horrendously awkward that it was unsalvageable. Fuck, this girl doused him with water and he still wanted to date her.

He knocked on the door, three solid raps. Mercedes opened it half a second later, her lips pursed in a tight smile. 

“Um. I’m here for Annette?” Felix frowned. 

“She’s almost ready,” Mercedes said. She leaned against the door frame, as if keeping Felix from crossing the threshold. “Now, Felix. Please take good care of Annie. She’s been through a lot.”

Felix blinked. “And I haven’t?” 

“I think you’re good for each other.” Mercedes looked over her shoulder, then smiled. “She’s coming. Say hi to Sylvain for me.” 

“Wha—”

“Felix!” Annette shouted as she flew from the doorway. “You didn’t have to come get me! I mean, I’m glad you did but you didn’t have to.” 

“Have fun, you two!” Mercedes waved and went back into the house, leaving Felix and Annette alone.

—

The drive to the restaurant was uneventful. They chatted about their dance while Annette sang along to the radio. By the time they parked, the sun was half-set and bathing them in its tangerine glow. 

“Have you ever been here before?” Annette asked as they got out of the car. She looked over at Felix, her shoulder brushing against his arm. The fleeting contact sent a brief shiver up her spine, as if she hadn’t spent the greater part of the day rolling on him during rehearsal. They were on a date, a  _ real _ date. Why should she be embarrassed?

“Yeah. We come here after shows someti—” Felix cut himself off. Annette had threaded her fingers through his, and it felt almost like he had been burned. His face flushed hot, and  _ fuck _ was he glad that Sylvain wasn’t here to see him blush like a schoolgirl. 

Annette yanked her hand back, her own cheeks growing scarlet. “I’m sorry, I just thought…” 

“You can hold my hand, ‘Nette.” Felix took her hand in his once more, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“You were blushing. I just thought—”

“I wasn’t blushing!” Felix exclaimed, while blushing. “It’s fine. Let’s go.” 

They walked into the restaurant, hand in hand, and sat down at a booth near the window. The dying evening light pooled around them, giving a small yet intimate glow. If she were in a scene from one of the rom-coms that Annette and Mercedes liked to watch, that kind of lighting would mean that their date would go perfectly. 

Then again, Annette knew that this wasn’t a movie.

“I promise not to spill anything on you this time,” she laughed as she took a sip of her moscato. A promise, but one Annette knew there was a non-zero chance she couldn’t keep. After all, she was nearly late to their date because she accidentally sneezed while putting her mascara on. 

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” Truth be told, Felix probably wouldn’t care if she spilled on him again. Annette was a klutz when not  _ en pointe _ , but that wasn’t a drawback for him. Hell, if Ingrid were there, she’d tease him for letting Annette melt his cold, icy heart. 

She looked down at her menu, trying to hide the growing blush on her face. Of course she’d make things awkward. First by grabbing his hand, then by teasing him with her own stupid mistake. So, she studied the various dishes, trying her hardest not to screw up again.

Felix watched her practically glare at the menu, her wrinkled nose, the strain in her eyebrows. Did he do something wrong? He had purposely avoided asking Sylvain for advice, but now he was kicking himself for going in blind. Maybe he should have asked Ingrid, but she was so busy with light design that—

“I really like it here at Seiros.” Annette broke the silence, since she already managed to pass over all the desserts. “Everyone’s an amazing dancer.”

Small talk. Okay. Felix could handle that. He hated it, but he had been forced to mingle at enough events throughout his life that it wouldn’t kill him. Why was it so different talking to her in this setting? 

“I’m really glad you’re here.” Felix blushed. “I enjoy dancing with you.”

“Even though I can’t  _ glissade _ for shit?” Annette watched as the hostess guided a tall, scraggly looking blonde to a table a few down from theirs.

“I take it back, okay? You might not be able to walk without tripping, but you can in fact  _ glissade—”  _ Felix cut himself off, his entire body going cold. He grabbed his menu and held it to obscure his face, though he was sure that the damage had already been done. 

_ Dimitri. _ Felix hadn’t seen him since Glenn’s funeral, by choice. Despite the fact that he still hung around the dance company (even though he himself couldn’t dance any longer) Felix had found multiple creative ways to avoid him. 

No, it wasn’t Dimitri’s fault that they got into the accident, but it was Dimitri’s fault that Glenn was even on the road that night. Just thinking about him made Felix’s skin crawl and his chest tighten. Of course he would show up just as things were turning around, a specter of his past haunting him. Just like that, a lifetime of friendship gone in a puff of smoke.

“Felix?” Annette asked. “Is everything okay?” 

She had seen him like this before, that night at Zanado’s before they ended up at her place. Even if she hadn’t, she was tightly wound enough to know the halo of a panic attack when she saw one. 

Felix peered over his shoulder, then put his menu down. He ran his hand over his hair, trying to count backwards from one hundred before his heart exploded. Annette reached across the table, her hand outstretched. He stared at her for a moment before reluctantly weaving his fingers through hers.

“I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” Annette asked.

Felix frowned. “Nothing.”

“That didn’t look like nothing. Who was that?” She peered over Felix’s shoulder, trying to get a better look at the man. “Do I have to fight him?” 

Felix chuckled at the mental image of Annette trying to fight Dimitri Blaiddyd, former male principal dancer for the Seiros Ballet Company. He had over a foot of height on her and could probably  _ rond de jambe _ her across the room with little effort. 

“What’s so funny? I just, you looked like you saw a ghost.” Annette stared into her glass of moscato, no longer very thirsty. 

“In a way, I did.” Felix ran his hand over his face, a low groan escaping his lips. “I didn’t really want to do this on a date, but…”

_ Oh good. It  _ is _ a date, _ Annette thought.

“I can’t really hide this shit anymore. You’re in the company anyway, you’ve probably heard some of the rumors.” 

“Actually, I haven’t,” she said. Felix raised an eyebrow, which immediately put her on the defensive. “I only really hang out with Mercie, and she knows I’m not here for gossip!” 

The way she said it gave Felix an odd pang in his chest.  _ Not here for gossip. _ Of course, none of them were. They were there because they loved to dance, because they were damn good at it. But Annette… She had a desperation in her eyes that felt way too familiar. It was the same look that he had, the same burning pain that no one else seemed to understand. 

Felix looked down into his absolutely untouched glass of cabernet and sighed. “I guess I never really asked what brought you here from the Fhirdiad ballet.”

“Oh no! We’re not avoiding the question. What’s going on, Fe?” She squeezed his hand, and it felt like his entire chest was going to disintegrate right then and there.

“That,” Felix sighed. “Was Dimitri Blaiddyd. He is— _ was _ in Seiros.”

“Wait.  _ That’s _ Dimitri Blaiddyd? I saw him dance once, years ago, but…” Annette trailed off, not sure of how she should proceed. The last time she saw Dimitri on stage, he looked so soft, so princely. The man that sat behind them was hunched over, his blonde hair hanging in his eyes—or  _ eye _ , rather. The other was covered in a black patch. 

“He was in an accident. A drunk driver went the wrong way down a one-way and…” It felt like Felix was drowning on dry land, like the entire world around him had slipped away. The only thing grounding him was the feeling of Annette’s hand in his, her soft skin brushing his. “My brother… He was driving the car Dimitri was in.”

“Is he okay?” The words tumbled from Annette’s mouth before she could stop them. She knew what the answer likely was going to be, and  _ Goddess _ she felt like a moron for asking. Felix was going to hate her, she ruined their date, and their dance, and probably the whole Spring charity showcase as well. 

“Pasta arrabbiata with meatballs?” 

Neither of them were sure when the waitress arrived, but  _ fuck _ it wasn’t the time. Still, Felix raised his hand and accepted his plate of spicy pasta, which left her to slide the bowl of creamy gnocchi in front of Annette. 

“I’m an idiot, I’m sorry.” Annette stabbed her fork into a particularly plump gnocchi, but didn’t dare put it anywhere near her mouth. Normally she’d devour the entire dish, but her appetite had died with the chance of this being a good date.

“You’re not— No, Glenn. He didn’t…” Felix put his head in his free hand. “I miss him. And my dad, he’s tried to turn him into some martyr against drunk driving and it just pisses me off.” 

“Dads are the worst,” Annette grumbled, thinking about how she spent the night before crying on Mercie’s shoulder because she was just so freaking  _ frustrated _ at her own. “Not that I’d really know. Mine left when I was a kid.”

Felix raised an eyebrow, still acutely aware of the fact that he was holding her hand over the table. “I thought your dad danced for Seiros?” 

“He did.” She chewed on the corner of her lip. “I came down here to try to get him to go see my mom. She’s, well, she’s not doing well.”

Silence fell between them, their pasta and wine untouched. Annette pulled her hand back into her lap, then poked again at the cooling cream sauce on her gnocchi. Felix’s remained where she left it, his palm still facing upwards. 

“Shit, ‘Nette.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, then took a big bite of his pasta. 

Annette watched him chew slowly. It was obvious that there was something that he wanted to say, but he was using his food as a way to avoid saying it. 

“I know, it’s stupid. I know. I wish she could just leave him behind but—”

“Can you stop saying that you’re stupid? Because, you really aren’t.” Felix’s amber eyes narrowed on hers. “We’re all fucked up. It doesn’t make me like you any less.” 

“You  _ like _ me?” 

Felix rolled his eyes. “If I didn’t, would I have the  _ plié _ song stuck in my head?” 

—

**Sylvain:** How’d your date go?

**Felix:** Fine, why?

**Sylvain:** Dimitri said he saw you at the restaurant.

**Sylvain:** You can’t ignore him forever you know.

That, Felix thought, was where Sylvain was wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really sorry it took a bit to get this chapter out. My dad ended up getting sick, and even though he ended up with a milder case, I was absolutely Not Okay and Not Handling it Well. I'm not even sure if I really like this chapter, or where this fic is going, but I'm trying to keep writing because ?? I don't want to lose this.
> 
> Sorry for getting emo in the A/N. This has been brought to you by Desert Song by My Chemical Romance, you're welcome.


	5. Incessant, Merciless Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, the pasta date was a bit of a bust, but that doesn't mean things couldn't get better right?
> 
> Wrong. 
> 
> Annette learns the hard way why no news is good news.

“So, I heard you went out with Felix the other night,” Hilda asked, before blowing a huge bubble with her wad of gum. They were both in one of the costuming rooms, idly chatting as Balthus and Hapi pinned scraps of fabric in place. 

Annette usually liked costume fittings, as they gave her a feel for what the final piece would end up looking like, but she was so nervous that she could barely stand still. 

“Um, yeah? Is that a bad thing?” she asked, silently hoping that this wasn’t an attempt to be catty. Hilda didn’t seem like that type, but Annette had only really spoken to her in passing in the dressing room.

“Goddess, no! Honestly, I’m glad he’s finally bouncing back. Plus, the way he looks at you is  _ adorable. _ ” Hilda popped her gum. “Ouch! Hapi!” 

“I’ll poke you again if you keep popping. Don’t get gum on my costumes,” Hapi snapped, before going back to pinning.

Hilda rolled her eyes, adjusting so that she could avoid getting stabbed again. “Really. Felix is a good guy. Handsome too.” 

Annette felt her entire face grow hot. It would take layers upon layers of Yuri’s stage makeup to cover the scarlet hue of her cheeks, which was why she didn’t usually engage in gossip. Especially not about boys.  _ Especially _ , especially not about boys and  _ her _ . 

“It was only one date,” she squeaked. Only one date, but they saw each other every day. And they’d been texting each other cat pictures back and forth since that night. Who would have thought Felix liked cats? 

But there was still a lot hanging in the back of her mind. They weren’t reservations, but the encounter with Dimitri at the restaurant was still fresh. There was a lot on Felix’s plate, and it honestly hurt her to see him like that. 

“Well, whatever you did on that date, you should keep it up. He’s starting to act more like his old self again.” Hilda smoothed her hand over the sheer black fabric floating over her legs, admiring herself in the mirror like the snack she was. “You should get him to come get drinks with us again.”

“It must have really hurt him.” Annette frowned. “Losing his brother like that.”

“I mean, we were all pretty sad about it. Glenn was good. Like,  _ really _ good. Not Dimitri’s level, but…” Hilda wrinkled her nose. “It fucked us all up. But it  _ really _ fucked Felix up. I don’t think he’ll ever forgive Dimitri.” 

Annette raised an eyebrow. She toyed with one of the pieces of gold, gauzy fabric, rubbing it between her fingers until one of Balthus’ giant hands swatted her away. “I don’t think I understand? I know Dimitri was in the car, but how was it his fault?” 

She could practically hear the collective  _ oof _ in the room, the sound of all the air leaving everyone’s lungs at the exact same time. It drove Annette crazy to be the only one in the room who wasn’t in on the big secret, but at the same time, it felt  _ wrong _ to be snooping in on Felix’s personal life.

“So, the December before last were all drinking at Zanado’s to celebrate the Nutcracker closing,” Hilda explained. “And like, Dimitri’s dad had just been murdered, but he had been trying to put on a brave face the whole time because he was the lead and we needed him, or whatever.” 

Annette swallowed the lump forming in her throat and tried to keep her focus on the pins and clips and the smell of Balthus’ woodsy cologne. Things that were real, that could keep her grounded even as her anxiety spiked. 

“And like, Dimitri had  _ way _ too much to drink. He was just, falling over and sobbing and trying to fight the furniture. So Glenn was like,  _ oh I’ll take him home and make sure he’s okay _ , because that’s how Glenn  _ was. _ He could be the biggest asshole in the room, but he still gave a fuck, you know?” Hilda explained.

“How does this fit?” Balthus asked Annette, pulling her out of the fog of the story. How an absolute beefcake of man became a costume designer for a ballet company, Annette could never guess, but since she got here she wasn’t sure if  _ anything _ made sense. “Can you breathe?” 

She nodded. “Yeah, it fits well.”

“Anyway, so like—” Hilda sighed, twisting in the mirror so she could see how her ass looked in the costume. “Glenn was gonna take Dima home, make sure he was okay and didn’t choke on his own vomit and die, and then when the party was over he was going to go back to get Ingrid. Ingrid, you know, in light design? They were engaged. So he was planning to get her, but they didn’t even make it to Dimitri’s place.” 

“That’s awful…” Annette’s hand flew to cover her mouth. She felt almost sick to her stomach, like she had walked into something that she just wasn’t supposed to hear. In a way, that  _ was _ true. She probably should have asked Felix, not  _ Hilda _ of all people, but… 

“Speak of the devil…” Hilda mumbled under her breath. “Dima! What are you doing down here?”

Annette looked away from the mirror to see Dimitri in all his one-eyed glory, dressed in a loose gray t-shirt and a pair of navy sweatpants. Despite the lax clothes, he looked slightly more put together than when she had taken a side-eyed glance at him the night before. His golden blonde hair was swept back neatly in a half up-half down type style, which only accentuated the eye patch that he wore. 

He looked Annette up and down, a neutral expression on his face, but she couldn’t help but feel like he was sizing her up like a predator stalking its prey. Did he recognize her from the restaurant? Maybe he didn’t. He didn’t try to talk to Felix at all, so maybe he hadn’t noticed them the way that they had noticed him? 

“Byleth wanted me to check on the fitting, and grab some pictures of the costumes,” Dimitri frowned. “You know how particular she can be.” 

“Ugh, don’t remind me. She spent like, fifteen solid minutes the other day telling me she  _ knows _ I can get my leg higher than that. Like,  _ yeah _ , I can, but why do it now and waste my energy?” Hilda rolled her eyes and sat down in one of the makeup chairs, her back unnaturally straight to avoid jamming any pins through her skin.

Dimitri watched Annette through one crystal blue eye, his gaze unwavering. If she felt queasy before, now it was like she had an trenta strawberry creme frapp followed by thirty  _ fouettés _ in a row.

“I don’t think we’ve met. Um, I’m Annette. Dominic.” She held out her hand, even though her mouth was sand-dry and her knees were shaking. There was no reason for her to be nervous. It wasn’t like Dimitri was going to rip her throat out or  _ do _ anything. Yeah, Felix had a beef with him, but it wasn’t like either of them were in the wrong. 

“Dominic? You wouldn’t happen to be Gustave’s daughter, would you?” Dimitri asked.

She was way past the frap now. It was more like she had eaten an entire jumbo funnel cake with ice cream and gotten straight on the tilt-o-whirl at the Fhirdiad Fair. Somehow, despite being in the company for near a month, she had managed to avoid every mention of her father.  _ Fuck _ , she hadn’t even seen him in passing, and despite her mission, she kind of liked it that way.

But now Dimitri was putting her on the spot, and everyone  _ knew _ that  _ yes, _ she was Gustave Dominic’s daughter, but really in name only. It wasn’t like she was trained by him, or that he even went to a single recital she was in as a kid. Now wasn’t the time her her bitterness and drama, though. 

“Um, yeah?” Annette’s gaze fell to her bare feet, mentally picking at the chipped blue nail polish on her toes. “That’s me.”

“Well, it’s nice to finally meet you. I was trained by Gustave, you know.” Dimitri finally smiled, but Annette was one hundred percent sure she was going to hurl on his shoes. 

Of course he trained Dimitri. No one would be  _ that _ good without being taught by one of the best.  _ Fuck _ , her father could train a total stranger, but not his own daughter? 

“Hey, ‘Nette?” Hilda poked her in the side. “You okay? You’re looking a little pale.”

“We’re done pinning, if you wanna get pics you can get changed.” Balthus cracked his knuckles, barely spurring Annette from the anxiety-induced daze that she had found herself in.

“Um, yeah. Grab the shots. If you want to talk later, Dimitri, you can get my number from Mercie.” Annette didn’t really want to talk to Dimitri later, but at the same time he probably knew where she could find her father. Still, she posed for the pictures, then changed back into her leotard and tights as fast as she could.

Annette made her way up the stairs two at a time, her heart a coked-up hummingbird in her chest. She didn’t know why she was so fucked up about this, about the fact that her father had taught Dimitri and not her. Shouldn’t she have known? Shouldn’t this have been old fucking hat? 

She made it back to the main floor and turned to make it into the studio when she, in classic Annette fashion, crashed into someone walking through the hall. 

“Excuse me, sorry,” she mumbled under her breath, barely paying attention to where she was going again.

“Annette?” The voice sounded so familiar, yet so foreign that it gave her goosebumps. Annette knew who it belonged to before she even looked up, but  _ Goddess _ she wished she didn’t.

“Dad?” Her voice cracked, making her sound like she was six years old again and she watched him pack up his car. 

He looked older than she remembered him, but that was to be expected. It had been what? Ten years since she’d seen him last. His orange-red hair was streaked through with gray, his face full of heavy lines. He’d put on weight, too. 

“Annette, I—”

“We need to talk.” Annette straightened her back, trying to look like she wasn’t just a hair over five feet tall. She had to be strong, not just for her mom, but for herself. Except, she didn’t feel strong at all. In fact, it felt like the floor was sinking beneath her feet.

“I don’t have time for this, Annette. I didn’t even know you were here—”

“That’s right. You never had time.” Annette turned on her heels and ran. It didn’t matter that there weren’t many places to run in the studio, but she needed to get away. So she bolted down the hallway, heading towards control room as if that would put any kind of distance between her and her father.

—

Felix was warming up at the  _ barre _ when he saw Annette run by the studio door. She was late already, and by the way that she sprinted, it didn’t seem like she was planning on coming at all. He had only danced with her for about a month, but she was the captain of the punctuality boat. 

Something had to be wrong.

“I’ll be right back,” he told Byleth, before chasing after Annette.

He could already hear Sylvain teasing him in his head, poking fun at him for having a thing for the soft sunshine girl. Still, his feet seemed to move on their own, fueled by the need to know just what was wrong. He wanted to help her, to stop whatever was making her run.

Goddess, he was in deep.

—

Annette had never been in the control room before, not even when she danced for the Fhirdiad ballet, but it was the first place she could think of where her father wouldn’t follow. 

Actually, the more she thought about it, her father probably wouldn’t have followed her even if she walked straight into the studio and started rehearsing. 

_ Crackers. _ She was supposed to be in rehearsal now. Felix was probably waiting for her, and she just  _ ran _ —

“Can I help you?” a woman with short blonde hair asked as she stared Annette down. 

“Sorry,” Annette squeaked. “I just, needed to get away. I didn’t know anyone was in here! I just—” 

“Hey, are you okay?” the woman asked, her brow furrowed. Annette could only wonder what the blonde was thinking. Annette had her back pressed against the heavy door, body shaking while trying her hardest not to cry. She was probably wondering  _ what the fuck is going on? _

“I’m— I’ll be fine, really.”

The blonde frowned. “Well, if you’re sure… Wait. Are you Annette?”

Annette already had her hand on the doorknob, but she wasn’t going anywhere now. She was already super done with people today, and all she wanted to do was curl up on her couch with a pint of Chocolate Therapy and watch  _ Tidying Up with Marie Kondo, _ but that wasn’t happening. Besides, she still had a rehearsal to get back to.

“Um, yeah? That’s me. Annette.” And there was the return of the  _ I’m going to sink into the floor _ feeling.

“I’m Ingrid. Felix and I grew up together, so it’s really good to finally meet yo—”

Ingrid was cut off by the door flying open to reveal Felix, his amber eyes sharp and narrowed. “‘Nette, are you okay?” 

“Nice of you to join us, Fe,” Ingrid teased. 

Annette looked at Ingrid, then Felix, then back to Ingrid. This whole day was giving her whiplash and she had all of these things that she knew now but couldn’t say. Somehow she was caught in this tangled web of drama and death and she wasn’t quite sure how to sort it all out. 

Ingrid. She was the one engaged to Felix’s brother, Glenn. Glenn who died driving Dimitri home, Dimitri who was trained by her father, her father who left her and her mother high and dry. 

She put her heed in her hands and slid down to the floor, the tears coming before she could even attempt to stop them. Felix kneeled down next to her, his body impossibly warm near hers.

“I’ll text Byleth and cancel rehearsal. Come on, I’ll take you home.” Felix grabbed her hand and pulled her back up to her feet, his heart pounding in his chest. That combination of words made him feel queasy, and the somber look on Ingrid’s face didn’t help. 

“Be safe, okay?” she squeaked, suddenly so much smaller than she was before. Felix nodded in return, then lead Annette out as she quietly sniffled into his shoulder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mothers and Fuckers of the jury, I present to you... angst.
> 
> I am not sorry. 
> 
> Since I forgot last time, today's bisexual mood is that 25th anniversary recording of phantom of the opera with Sierra Boggess and Ramin Karimloo. And Hadley Fraser too. He was really hot as well.


	6. Did You Dream Too?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After an emotional rollercoaster of a day, Felix tries to cheer Annette up.

Thankfully, because of how close Annette lived to the studio, she had walked instead of drove. Felix wasn’t sure what he’d have to do if they eventually had to play a game of musical chairs, but with cars. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Felix asked as he slid the key in the ignition, the car filling with the sound of metal music. 

“Talk about what?” 

“I found you in the control room  _ crying _ , ‘Nette. Are you okay?” Felix unbuckled his seatbelt, which was fine considering they hadn’t yet moved from his parking space, and wrapped his arm around her. He slipped his index finger underneath her chin, just as he did in their dance, and tilted her head so that she would look him in the eye. 

Her breath caught in her throat, halfway between a giggle and a sob. On one hand, she was kind of tickled by the fact that Felix, prickly Felix, was soft on her. On the other hand she really wanted to just sink to the center of the Earth and then yeet herself to the moon just so that she wouldn’t have to face her father again.

“No,” she sighed. “I’m not.”

Felix returned to his seat and gripped the steering wheel, racking is brain for something—anything to say. Feelings had never been his strong suit. Before Glenn died, he expressed his emotions more. Now though? He stayed with the tried and true method of  _ I’m going to take my grief and swallow it whole until I’m about to explode. _

It probably wasn’t healthy. He probably should have gone to see that therapist Ingrid recommended instead of just lying and saying that he did, but it wasn’t for him. But it wasn’t his own emotions and problems that were the problem. Annette was the one that was sad, Annette was the one who needed the kind hand.

“Do you want to talk about it, or do you want to go home?” 

“Both? Neither? I don’t know.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, smudging a bit of eyeliner and mascara across her lids. “Just drive.”

He re-buckled his seatbelt and pulled out of the parking spot. Just drive could mean a lot of things; drive her home, drive her to Starbucks, drive to his place, just drive around with no end in sight. 

_ Just drive. _ She was still sniffling, and he could tell that there were still fresh tears dotting her cheeks. He wanted to reach out and swipe them away, but that seemed far too intimate for where they stood. That, and he still hadn’t been able to shake the slight tight feeling in his chest that driving gave him. 

“It’s just that… Y-you know, I’ll  _ n-never _ be good enough for him!” Annette’s words caught in her throat, her chest rising and falling with every sob.

“Good enough for who?” Felix frowned. 

Annette didn’t answer, instead choosing to pick at her cuticles like she hadn’t said anything.

He was trying his hardest to keep his eyes on the road, but he found himself side-eyeing Annette every few moments to make sure that she was still in one piece. So he pulled into the parking lot of a nearby supermarket, found a quiet spot, and turned the car off. 

“Who says you’re not good enough?” Felix asked again, his amber eyes narrowed on her. “Because it wasn’t you that was fucking up our  _ pas de deux _ , that’s for damn sure.” 

It took her a moment to stop hiccup-crying long enough for her to wipe the tears and snot from her face. “My dad?”

“Your— What happened?” 

“You know, he trained Dimitri? But not me? He wouldn’t even go to  _ one _ dance recital, but he trained  _ Dimitri Blaiddyd.” _ Annette unbuckled her seatbelt and leaned over the center console, burying her face in Felix’s chest. 

He paused for a moment, trying to assess the situation before he royally screwed up. He had never been the one people went to for comfort, and the one time they tried… Felix screwed his eyes shut, trying to block out the memory of that cold December night, of Dimitri reaching out to him for help, yet he couldn’t provide. 

“Your father’s a dick.” Felix smoothed down Annette’s hair, which had long fallen free of its bun. “He doesn’t matter. You  _ are _ good enough.” 

She pulled away from Felix’s tear-soaked tee shirt, her blue eyes reddened and wet. “No! I’m not!” 

Annette wanted to tell him about the nights she’d spend in the studio in Fhirdiad, practicing until her body ached and her feet bled. How she’d boast that she’d rather dance than sleep, how she’d work and work until three stress fractures and nearly six months in a boot got her to listen. However, the words wouldn’t come. 

“Don’t—” Felix swallowed. “Don’t let your shitbag dad get to you.” 

“But I can’t! I can’t just ignore it. Dimitri was all like  _ ‘Well, it’s nice to finally meet you.’ _ so he must have talked abo—”

“You talked to Dimitri?” Felix interrupted, his brow furrowed.

“Um, yeah? He was taking some pics for Byleth during the fitting this afternoon?” 

“That son of a bitch.” Felix pulled out his phone and started typing furiously, his fingers clacking against the screen with every movement of his thumbs.

**Felix:** Tell Dimitri to leave Annette alone.

**Felix:** If he wants to talk to me, he can meet me face to fucking face.

**Sylvain:** ???

**Ingrid:** Fe are you okay?

Felix slammed his phone into the cupholder and pulled Annette close again. She could hear his heart racing in his chest as he smoothed down her hair. Their position somehow felt more intimate than any part of the their dance, despite the fact that they weren’t writhing all over each other. 

“Felix?” she mumbled, her voice barely above a whisper in the chilly car. 

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad I met you.” Annette nuzzled her face back into Felix’s heather gray shirt, breathing in the scent of his cedar cologne mixed with post-dance sweat. Her chest vibrated with a few good post-cry hiccups, causing the gear shift to poke uncomfortably into her side. 

“Me too, ‘Nette.” Felix sighed. “Want me to take you home now?” 

On one hand, she really wanted to dig into that pint of Chocolate Therapy. On the other, though, she really didn’t want Felix to leave. Normally she spent hours a day with him in rehearsal, so parting so early filled her with a different kind of sadness. But she didn’t want to seem needy by insisting that he stay. After all, they had only actually been on one date.

“Um, yeah?” She swallowed down the lump quickly forming in her throat, and pulled herself back into her seat. “That’s fine.”

It wasn’t fine.

“Home it is.” Felix drove past the small yellow house, raising an eyebrow when he noticed that there was already a flashy red convertible parked in front. It looked terribly out of place next to Annette’s bright orange Honda Fit, and Mercedes’ cream-colored VW Beetle. It was too bold, too bright, and  _ fuck _ Felix knew exactly who it belonged to. 

“Are Mercedes and Sylvain rehearsing at your place today?” he asked, raising an eyebrow as he parallel parked. 

“I don’t think so?” Annette sniffled, her tears still falling, but at a slower pace than before. She pulled a pack of Kleenex from her dance bag, then blew her nose. Part of her cringed with how unsexy that was, but the other part of her didn’t care. “Why?”

He didn’t think, he  _ knew _ that car was Sylvain’s. The model, the color, the dent on the front left of the hood that he was too lazy to get fixed from when one of his exes beat it with a golf club. If Sylvain and Mercedes  _ weren’t  _ rehearsing, he didn’t really want to know what they were doing. 

Mercedes didn’t seem like the type of person to fall for Sylvain’s mess, but he didn’t want to accidentally walk in on something that neither of them wanted to see. So, he turned to her and let out a heavy sigh.

“You want to go to my place instead?” 

Annette looked at him for a long moment, contemplating how she should phrase her answer so that Felix  _ didn’t _ know that she had been secretly wanting to keep hanging out with him. She looked at the red convertible, then her front door, then back to Felix.

“Sounds good to me.”

—

**Annette:** Are you with Sylvain? 

**Mercedes:** Yes? 

**Annette:** Do I need to fight him?

**Mercedes:** We’re just watching a movie! 

**Mercedes:** But thank you <3 

**Annette:** I’m going to Felix’s btw

**Annette:** Just in case I get murdered.

Annette tucked her phone back into her bag as they parked in the garage next to Felix’s building. She had heard whispers from some of the other dancers that Felix was from old money, but she hadn’t really taken them seriously until they pulled up to the high rise on Ten Elite Avenue. It was probably the nicest condo complex in town, with a doorman who knew Felix’s name and an elevator that actually played music. 

“Are you sure you’re okay with this?” Felix asked as he unlocked and opened his door. 

“I’m okay if you’re okay. Like, I don’t want to impose, but it seems like Mercie is busy and I just don’t want to be locked in my room by myself right now.” 

She followed him inside, taking in the Spartan scenery before her. Gray-white walls, a standalone black leather sofa, lots of room to move, and a rolling ballet barre tucked in the corner. It was very Felix, but it also felt empty.  _ Sad. _ Very Felix indeed. 

“I get it,” Felix said as he kicked off his street shoes. “Sometimes being alone sucks ass.” 

They both stood there awkwardly, watching and waiting for the other to do something— _ anything. _ This was only their third time hanging out in a non-rehearsal context, and only the second sort-of-date. How were they even supposed to act around each other? 

Normally if Felix wasn’t in rehearsal, he’d practice in his living room until his downstairs neighbors got pissed or his muscles started to ache, whichever came first. Then he’d eat something small, shower, and pass out face first and half naked in his bed. He couldn’t exactly do any of that with Annette, though.

“Do you want to watch something?” Felix asked. His face grew hot, probably blooming with a scarlet blush that he’d deny even if Annette pointed it out. “A movie? Maybe?” 

“Sure? What kind of movies do you like?” She sat down next to him on the couch, unsure of how much space she should leave between them. Leaning on the other arm seemed like it was too much room, too stiff and awkward. On the other hand, was it  _ okay _ for her to cuddle close to him, even though she wanted to? 

“I don’t really watch movies. So it’s fine if you pick.” Felix shrugged. 

After a bit of scrolling, Annette settled on Mulan. Somehow while trying to figure out what movie for them to watch, she managed to scoot close enough to Felix that their arms were touching. He hadn’t yet pulled away, so maybe it was okay? 

“I haven’t seen this since I was a kid,” Felix mused. “It was Ingrid’s favorite.”

“Mercie and I have a Disney movie night once a week. We bake cookies and then get under the blankets. She never wants to watch Mulan, though.” Annette rested her head on Felix’s shoulder, but he immediately stood up. 

Her heart started racing in her chest, wondering how she managed to screw up this fast. They were barely ten minutes into the movie, and she had already managed to make Felix run away. She already had an apology queued up in the back of her head when he came back from what she assumed was his bedroom and draped a large, navy blue blanket around their shoulders.

“Thank you…” She pulled the blanket tighter around her body, breathing in the soft scent of Felix woven into its fibers. Her head rested against him once more, her legs tucked up beside her. 

_ “Look at me… I will never pass for a perfect bride…” _

Oh. Now Annette remembered why Mercie never wanted to watch Mulan. As soon as the first notes of  _ Reflection _ started playing, she could already feel the oncoming sobs swimming in her chest. 

“‘Nette?” Felix turned to her, and she immediately pressed her face into his chest, the tears falling faster than she could stop them. He tried to shimmy forward to grab the remote and pause the movie, but that proved to be rather hard with the way that she was wrapped around his torso.

“I’m sorry,” Annette pulled back and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “That song doesn’t normally make me cry that hard. It’s just—”

“You don’t need to explain. It’s been a hard day for you. You should have seen me when—” Felix swallowed, his mouth suddenly desert-dry. “After Glenn. I’m pretty sure I cried at a yogurt cup.”

Annette laid back on the couch, putting her head in Felix’s lap so that she could look up at him. When she first met him he was sharp and rude, but he’d opened up to her since. Still, she couldn’t seem to picture him breaking down the way she just did. 

“What was he like? Glenn, I mean?” 

All the air rushed from Felix’s lungs, like he had just been kicked in the chest. Everyone around him always scrubbed Glenn’s memory squeaky clean, acting like the sun shone out of his ass and he never did any wrong. No, Glenn wasn’t a bad person, but he was  _ human _ . 

“He was rude. Loud. He knew exactly what to say in an argument to make you pissed as fuck and hate yourself,” Felix sighed. “But he also really gave a shit about his friends, about dance. He was driven, and talented…” 

“I wish I could have met him,” she said. 

A silence fell between them, only broken by the ragged sound of Felix’s labored breathing.

_ “Fuck,  _ I really miss him, ‘Nette.” 

Annette sat up slowly, so as not to startle him. She brushed a stray tear from his cheek with her thumb, their faces so close that their noses were touching. He looked down at her through half-lidded eyes, his hands wandering to pull her close.

“It’s okay to miss him.”

“I know.”

“And it’s okay to be sad.”

Felix nodded. He pulled back a hair, his amber eyes locked on Annette’s. “Is it okay if I kiss you?” 

Annette answered by closing the gap between them, her lips finding his in a tender embrace. She threw her arms around his neck, bringing their bodies flush just like in their dance. She felt like she was flying, absolutely soaring, and she never wanted to come back down. 

When he finally pulled away, it felt like the Earth shattered around them. Their breath came out in ragged spurts, searching for a way to regain lost air. This was what their dance was missing, that energy, that closeness. All Felix wanted to do was put on his ballet slippers and rehearse until his legs fell out from under him. 

“So, not to be  _ that _ girl, but what does this mean?” she asked, her cheeks pink with embarrassment. 

“What do you want it to mean? I like you. I assume you like me?”

“I do.” Annette exhaled, then clapped her hands over her face so that Felix couldn’t see that her face was just about as red as her hair. “But like. Do you want to be like, more than dance partners?” 

“Annette Dominic, are you asking me to be your boyfriend?” Felix teased.

“Yes, okay? Yes, that is what I’m asking.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “You can be such a villain.” 

“Maybe I just like it when you blush.” Felix cracked a smirk, even though he wasn’t completely okay yet. But, would Glenn really want him to lose his shit like that? 

“So. Felix Fraldarius, will you be my boyfriend?” she asked.

He took her hands in his and gently weaved his fingers between hers. She could feel each and every one of his callouses from the  _ barre _ , and tried to memorize each and every bump.

“Yes, I will.”

Annette looked away, even though there was no hiding just how flustered she was. “Can I ask you another question?” 

“Go ahead.”

“Can you kiss me again?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> Yes I'm angsty garbage? 
> 
> I wanted to have the kiss last chapter but I didn't get around to it.
> 
> There was something I was going to put in this chapter that's gonna be moved to next.
> 
> Will we ever make it to the Spring Charity Showcase? Who knows?
> 
> Today's Big Bi Energy is uhhhhhhh. Roy Mustang and Riza Hawkeye from Fullmetal Alchemist.


	7. Tripping Over From Slumber

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Have you ever felt
> 
> like the world was 
> 
> going to fall out
> 
> beneath
> 
> your
> 
> feet?

Felix awoke to several knocks on his front door, each one louder and more urgent than the last. He pulled himself up from the bed as slowly as he could, wiping the thick sleep from his eyes. All of his muscles ached, a side effect of his practicing the night before, causing his body to feel heavy and alien. 

Even without the incessant knocking, his head pounded. Just moving made his stomach roll, but there was no time to brush his teeth or take a piss. Not with someone banging on his door at five in the morning. 

_ Five in the morning. _ Had he really only gotten three hours of sleep again? 

He probably should have looked through the peephole, but his head was pounding and he just wanted the noise to stop. Top lock, bottom lock… he swung the door open to reveal Dimitri standing on his welcome mat, a pair of coffee cups in hand. 

Felix slammed the door, his hand still hovering on the knob. It was too damn early in the morning, he hadn’t gotten enough sleep,  _ and _ he was supposed to meet Annette in an hour. There was no way in hell that he could deal with Dimitri right now.

“Fe, open the door.”

“Fuck off, Dimitri.”

“Weren’t you the one who said to meet you—” Dimitri cleared his throat—  _ “Face to fucking face?” _

Felix reopened the door with a heavy sigh. He ran a hand through his unbrushed hair, frowning as his fingers caught in a mass of tangles. 

“Give me a minute to piss and shower,” Felix mumbled, before walking back in the direction of his bedroom.

**Felix:** Small problem. Might be late.

**Annette:** Everything okay?

**Felix:** Yeah.

He looked down at his phone and frowned, thinking of how open Annette had been with him. Could he really lie to her?

**Felix:** No.

**Felix:** Dimitri showed up at my place.

**Felix:** fuckfuckfuckfuck.

**Annette:** Do you want me to come over?

**Felix:** No.

He would have left it at that, but it didn’t feel quite right.

**Felix:** I’ll see you at rehearsal.

**Annette:** Call me if you need help! <3

**Annette:** Good Luck!!!

_ Good Luck. _ Fuck, he was going to need it. 

—

Annette stared at her phone on the kitchen island, her cheek smooshed up in her hand.  _ Good Luck. _ Was that the right thing to say? It didn’t feel like it. When they ran into Dimitri at the pasta restaurant, it looked as if Felix was going to fall over right then and there. Would he really be okay dealing with Dimitri alone in his apartment?

She sighed. Felix was going to be fine. Despite the breakdown Dimitri triggered in her the week prior, she knew that deep down, he wasn’t  _ malicious. _ It wasn’t like Felix was in  _ danger _ . Still, she couldn’t shake the nagging feeling in the back of her head that something was wrong. 

Hopefully, she was just paranoid.

—

“So, why are you really here, Boar?” Felix asked as he emerged from his bedroom, still wringing his damp hair out with a towel. 

“You’re avoiding me.” Dimitri sighed. 

“Yeah, well. There’s a reason I’ve been avoiding you.” 

_ You can’t ignore him forever you know. _ Sylvain’s text echoed in the back of Felix’s head, twisting his stomach into a discarded friendship bracelet’s worth of knots. It didn’t help that he hadn’t eaten breakfast yet—  _ Wait. _ Had he even eaten dinner the night before? 

“Felix—”

“What do you want me to say?” Felix slammed his hands on the granite countertop, wincing as flesh met stone. “That I forgive you? Because, I don’t. If you hadn’t lost control, I would still have a brother.” 

“I had just lost my  _ father _ , Fe.” Dimitri ran an enormous hand over his face, jostling the eyepatch slightly out of place. His pale skin was marred with red scar tissue, and even though it had long healed, it still looked painful. “I lost my father. I lost Glenn, my  _ ability to dance _ . Don’t make me lose you too.” 

“Make you?” Felix laughed. “You did this to yourself!” 

Dimitri opened his mouth to respond, but Felix cut him off again.

“Don’t act like you have nothing. You have Byleth,  _ my _ father. Fuck, you even have  _ ‘Nette’s dad _ wrapped around your little finger. Do you even care how  _ she _ feels?” Felix was leaned half over the island, his hands gripping into the granite so hard that he wondered if they would just break. 

“What?” Dimitri blinked, sitting back in his stool like he just received a kick to the chest. 

“That’s what pisses me the fuck off, Dimitri. You make everything about you. My  _ brother died _ , and my dad was too busy wiping your damn nose to even give a  _ shit _ about how I felt.” Felix’s chest vibrated with the violent force of a held-back sob. He couldn’t even bear to look at Dimitri’s face. “My brother isn’t a martyr! He isn’t a fucking  _ after school special!” _

“Felix—”

“He’s  _ dead _ , Dimitri.” Felix screwed his eyes shut to try to hold back the tears. “He’s dead, and everyone tiptoes around it, and  _ I can’t handle it anymore. _ ”

Dimitri straightened in his chair, full of the dancer’s poise that he spent years cultivating. “I’m sorry that you’re hurting, Felix. And I’m sorry that you and your father don’t see eye to eye. But it’s not my fault that Glenn isn’t here.”

He rose from the stool and pushed it back under the island, his single blue eye never losing contact with Felix’s. 

“I think it’s time for me to go, but please. Think about what I said.” 

—

**Felix:** omw to the studio.

**Annette:** You okay?

Annette stared at her phone as she sat on the bench in the dressing room, waiting for a response. To say that she was worried about Felix would be an understatement. Dimitri was a storm of bad feelings for Felix, and unless a miracle happened in the city of Garreg Mach, she didn’t think there was anyway that they just hugged it out.

Hell, if she was in Felix’s position, she’d probably feel the same. Despite the fact that she had only had a very brief conversation with the former principal dancer, she couldn’t help but feel an intense jealousy bud in her chest whenever she thought of him. 

No, it wasn’t his fault that her father left, but he received all of the thought and care and attention that she should have gotten throughout the years. 

It hurt. It made her mad.  _ Pissed _ , even. She wanted to scream and cry and stomp and tell him off, but that wouldn’t do anything to bring back the years she lost. All it would do is hurt them both. 

Not that she was really planning on befriending Dimitri anyway. As Felix Fraldarius’ girlfriend, she kind of had to hate him on principle, just like Felix had to hate that Monica girl who once put thumbtacks in Annette’s pointe shoes in summer camp. It was a matter of solidarity.

But still. They ran in the same circles. And she couldn’t really avoid Dimitri, just as she couldn’t avoid her father the next time she ran into him at the studio. She still had a mission, after all, even if she had taken a detour to get there. 

“Sorry I’m late.” Felix entered the studio, and all Annette could think was that he looked like freshly mown ass. His still-damp hair was falling from its elastic and hanging in his face, his eyes were red and rimmed with dark shadows. It looked like he hadn’t slept at all, possibly in several nights. No wonder he hadn’t answered her text, because he  _ clearly _ was Not Okay.

“Felix?” She rose from her spot on the ground, but stopped short of running to him. After all, she didn’t want to seem too clingy. “Is everything—”

“I’m fine. Let’s warm up.” Felix placed one hand on the  _ barre _ and began running through his warmups, his body aching with every little  _ plié. _

Annette watched him out of the corner of her eye during her own  _ barre _ routine. Her focus was split between perfectly pointing her feet and worrying about Felix. There was so much that she wanted to ask him.  _ Why was Dimitri at your place at five in the morning? What did you talk about? Are you really okay? _ However, it was obvious that Felix didn’t want to talk about it. 

Should she push him?

“Are you ready?” Felix’s voice snapped her out of her daze and returned her to the task at hand: their  _ pas de deux. _

“Um,” Annette swallowed. “Yeah.”

“I’ll start the music.” Felix walked over to the speakers, trying his hardest to hide the fact that every single one of his limbs felt like lead. He didn’t want to worry her, didn’t want to clue her into the fact that he was as fucked up as he was. That Dimitri’s visit had bothered him, and that everything around him felt like a stormy sea of shit. 

But the violins started, and all of Felix’s other thoughts melted away. Annette was dancing, and when she danced, she commanded attention. Despite the fact that she was a disaster on two feet,  _ en pointe _ she was a force of nature, the epitome of grace and sunshine. This was the best that she’s danced since they started working on the dance in January, and he could not take his eyes off of her.

Or, at least that’s what he told himself when he almost missed his cue. It was Annette’s dancing that distracted him, not the roll of nausea that sank through his chest. But he made it through the first lift, then the second. But the synchronized  _ fouetté _ sequence made the room spin underneath him, or maybe it was his head? 

Everything was turning and turning and he couldn’t make it stop until the ground fell out from under him. 

_ “Felix!” _

Felix hit the floor with a loud  _ thud _ . Pain radiated through his head and hip and shoulder, even as his eyes fluttered shut. 

—

The last time Annette had been that scared was when Mercie convinced her to watch the original Japanese Ring movie. Watching Felix collapse during rehearsal, however? That was a whole new kind of fear. It was the kind that made her stomach churn and her heart race and her palms sweat.

_ Would Felix care if she touched him with her sweaty palms? _

“Felix?” 

She shook his shoulder, and his eyes blinked back open. “‘Nette?” 

Annette wrapped her arms around Felix, cementing him into her unrelenting hug. His body was burning hot and just as sweaty as her palms, but she didn’t care. He was okay. Mostly okay. 

“Are you okay?” 

“Annette…”

“Don’t  _ Annette _ me!” She grabbed Felix’s cheeks in her palms, squeezing them slightly as she got him to focus on her. “You scared me! You look like you haven’t slept and you’re  _ burning _ up, and—”

He cut her off with a soft, lethargic kiss. “I’m fine. I just pushed myself too hard.” 

Annette’s fingers flew to her lips. Her brain was still a mess of scrambled eggs and emotions, and she could barely process what was going on. Felix Fraldarius was giving her major emotional whiplash, and it was so annoying that he was going to make her scream.

“You can’t just  _ do _ that, Felix. It’s not good for you.”

“I’m not going to get better by lying around.” Felix tried to stand, but Annette’s hand and the full force of her weight kept him down. 

“It’s not  _ lying around _ . It’s called  _ sleeping _ . You should try it sometime.” Annette was the one speaking, but she could hear Mercie’s voice in the back of her head. How many times had they had this exact same conversation? 

It hadn’t been as bad since she left Fhirdiad, the urge to practice until she collapsed, but it was still there. Mercedes said it was a form of self harm, a way for her to punish herself for not being perfect. Could that be what Felix was feeling too? 

“You don’t understand!” Felix snapped, his amber eyes dark and lethargic. She knew how acerbic he could be when he wanted, but even his sharp tone fell flat.

“Tell me what I don’t understand, Felix.” Annette frowned. “Because me and my three-stress-fractures-in-three-months seem to be understanding just fine.”

“That’s different. Come on, we can’t miss another rehearsal.”

“Forget about rehearsal! You just  _ collapsed. _ You’re not okay! Something is wrong and I don’t want you to hurt yourself because I  _ care _ about you!” Annette gripped the fabric of her wraparound skirt, fingernails scratching her thighs through her tights. Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes, but she tried her hardest not to let them fall.  _ Not now _ . 

Felix rested his head against her shoulder, the wispy navy blue strands of hair that had escaped from his bun tickling her skin. He took a breath, then weaved his fingers through hers. Maybe she  _ was _ right; maybe he  _ was _ being stupid, but the showcase was only a month away and they had already missed a rehearsal the week before. How was he supposed to get better if they didn’t rehearse, if he didn’t push himself past his limits?

“I’m sorry,” he sighed. “You’re right.” 

Her shoulder began to grow damp, Felix’s fever-scalding body shaking against hers.  _ Tears. _

She turned to face him, but he fell forward, his head buried in her chest as he sobbed. It felt like the room was closing in around him— around  _ them _ — and there was no way out. 

“If I  _ don’t do this _ , then how can I ever be as good as Glenn?” 

“No… No, we’re not doing this.” Annette undid Felix’s hair tie, letting his long locks spread over the sweat-sheen of his skin. She ran her fingers down his scalp, humming softly as she tried to calm him down. “You’re not Glenn. You’re  _ Felix. _ You’re Felix, and you’re  _ amazing. _ ”

He sat up slowly, his eyes red and puffy with half-formed tears, his dark hair hanging in a curtain around his face. There was something shockingly intimate about seeing him like this, broken and taped back together again. It made Annette’s chest tighten, her cheeks taking on a flaming scarlet hue. 

“I’m sorry, ‘Nette.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for.” She smiled softly, the worry that weighed heavy on her shoulders slowly melting away. “Here, I’ll get you some water, and then we’ll get you home.” 

“Right…” Felix ran his hand down his face, now struck with an overwhelming feeling of shame. If he had just taken care of himself, then they wouldn’t have to skip rehearsal again. If he hadn’t screwed up, Annette wouldn’t have to worry. 

—

**Annette:** Hey, can you make sure you check in on Felix? I’m worried he’s going to hurt himself.

**Annette:** Sorry, this is Annette. I got your number from Mercie.

**Sylvain:** Np.

**Sylvain:** Hurt himself how? 

**Annette:** He collapsed at rehearsal today. I don’t think he’s taking care of himself.

**Annette:** And he said Dimitri came by his condo this morning? 

**Annette:** I want to help him, but I know you and Ingrid know him better, and I just want him to be okay???? 

Annette started to type her fourth message in a row as she grabbed a water bottle from the company fridge. She didn’t care if Sylvain thought she was a nutjob. When she was at her lowest, Mercie was there for her. She only wanted the same for Felix.

Right as she was about to hit send, a text from a number she didn’t recognize flashed on her screen. 

**???:** Annette, it’s your father. I’m ready to talk when you are.

  
“Oh…  _ shit.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clap your hands if you love to see Felix cry!
> 
> Today's bisexual mood is the saxaphone solo in Careless Whisper. Why? Because I couldn't think of anything else.


	8. There's a Reason that We Met

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The path to healing is a long one,
> 
> but can we walk it together?

Annette hadn’t yet responded to her father’s text, yet his message still rang in the back of her head.  _ I’m ready to talk when you are. _ Yes, she was the one that initially told him that they needed to talk, but was she really ready to? She kept staring at her phone screen, unable to come up with any sort of response.

“Are you still thinking about your father?” Felix asked. 

They were cuddled up on Felix’s couch. Most of Annette’s body weight was thrown onto Felix, even as he adjusted the blanket around them. She could hear his heartbeat under her ear, a steady thrum that kept her grounded. Despite his fever a few days prior, he was alive and okay. 

“Yeah. I know I need to talk to him, even if it’s just for mom, but…”

“It’s harder than it sounds?” Felix finished for her. 

“Exactly! I mean, I think about it all the time, but the conversations in my head usually end with me screaming at him. And if I just lose my cool, he’s just going to leave and it’s not gonna help mom and—” Annette cut herself off, giving in to the gentle feeling of Felix’s fingers combing through her hair. “You’re evil, you know that?”

“Am I?” He looked down at her and all the air immediately vacated his lungs. She was so beautiful, so impossibly soft under his touch. Had she really only come into his life a month and a half prior? 

“You are! Touching my hair like that…” Her eyes fluttered shut. “I’m trying to be angsty, Felix.”

He immediately removed his hand from her pumpkin locks, holding both of his palms in the air in surrender. “I don’t know what to tell you, ‘Nette. If you want real advice, Sylvain’s been full of it since he started going to therapy.”

“Don’t  _ stop _ touching my hair!” Annette frowned, curling herself up closer to Felix’s body. After an over-exaggerated sigh, he began to touch her agian. “I guess we’re both avoiding someone we should be talking to.”

“I don’t want to talk about Dimitri.”

“Well, I don’t want to talk about my dad.” Annette peered up at him. “Can I ask you something, though?”

Felix sucked in a breath, already bracing himself for what was to come. “Sure, I guess.”

“Are you okay? Like, really okay?” she asked.

“Is this about the other day?” He expelled a heavy sigh, but didn’t pull away. It was odd. Normally his first instinct when someone cornered him like that would be to shut down and deny. There’s no problem, and there never was. 

It was the same line he gave Sylvain and Ingrid after he collapsed. Of course, they’ve known him long enough to be able to tell when he was lying through his teeth, but he expected that of them. With Annette, his first instinct wasn’t to lie to her. She was so open with him that it felt downright dirty to deceive her. 

“No. Yes. Felix, you  _ collapsed.” _

“I know. And I’m sorry.” Felix wrung the blanket in his hands. The desire to run was bubbling up in his chest faster than he could push it down, but even if Annette wasn’t lying across his lap, there was nowhere for him to run  _ to. _ They were in  _ his _ condo. He couldn’t just leave her. 

An uncomfortable silence fell between them, though neither wanted to move from the position they were in. Despite the tension, the familiar feeling of touch and being touched seemed to soothe their nerves.

Felix was the one to break the silence. “You said that you had an injury? Stress fractures, right?”

“Yeah. I would stay up all night to practice.  _ I’ll sleep when I’m dead, _ you know? Got the first one, and I kept taking the boot off. Then the second one happened. And then the third.” Annette sighed. “I thought Mercie was going to kill me.”

She pulled up a photo on her phone, one of her sitting on her couch in Fhirdiad, her booted foot propped up as she pouted at the camera. 

“Cute.”

“My foot was broken, Felix.” 

A grin broke out on his face, one that he couldn’t even attempt to hold back. “You’re always cute.”

Annette immediately blushed an intense scarlet. He thought she was cute? Always? “Evil. Absolutely, one-hundred percent—”

He cut her off with a kiss, soft and chaste against petal-soft lips. She tasted so saccharine-sweet, but he couldn’t get enough. They shifted on the couch, her body beneath his as he deepened the kiss. Her heart raced, breath catching as his tongue swept into her mouth. He pulled away for the briefest moment, pressing a feather-light kiss to her forehead. 

“Thank you for worrying about me,” Felix murmured against her ear. “I’ll be okay.”

“I…” Annette’s voice trailed off, her words catching in her throat before she could say something stupid. She’d barely been with Felix for two weeks. She couldn’t just blurt out that she loved him. She was probably just drunk on the fact that he kissed like a dream and she could feel every muscle of his torso against hers. “I really care about you, Felix.” 

Her words hit Felix in a way that he hadn’t expected. Of course he wanted her to care about him, but part of him wished that she had said something else. He had never been in love before, not really. Most of his girlfriends were short term things, and infrequent. It wasn’t like he was exactly easy to get along with, considering how intense he could be. 

But when he looked at Annette,  _ love _ was the only word that came to mind. He loved to dance with her, loved to listen to her sing silly songs when she did little things, loved to hold her in his arms on his couch, under a blanket while they were supposed to be watching Beauty and the Beast. 

_ I love you. _ Three words. I. Love. You. 

“If you don’t want to talk to him alone, I can come too,” was what he  _ actually _ said.

Annette closed her eyes for a moment, tangling her fingers in his. Maybe for the moment, that would be enough.

—

“Great rehearsal today.” Byleth clapped as the music ended, a slight twinkle in her eye. “Maybe Sylvain had the right idea.”

Both Felix and Annette’s faces went bright red. 

“W— _ what?” _ Annette felt like she was going to sink through the floor. She knew that Byleth was known for blunt comments, but was she really insinuating that she  _ knew what Annette and Felix did the night before? _

“The date? The Pasta Place the other week?” Byleth had this problem where she almost never showed an expression on her face. That was why neither Felix, nor Annette, could figure out if she was fucking with them. 

“Anyway. Keep up the good work.” 

Felix and Annette left the studio. He had both of their bags slung over his back, and yet he wasn’t even breaking a sweat. Her hand was tangled in his, their bodies close as they made their way into the brisk, late-winter air.

“Do you think she knows?” Annette’s cheeks were pink and hot, her brow furrowed. Even with that look of embarrassment, he still thought she was unfairly adorable. 

“She’s bluffing.”

“Did you tell Sylvain?” she asked.

“What? Why would Sylvain tell Byleth that we—”

“If you told Sylvain, Sylvain might have told Dimitri. And Dimitri could have told Byleth!” She ran her hand down her face to try to brush away the blush, but it was no use. It was there to stay. 

“I didn’t tell Sylvain.” Felix sighed. “He guessed.”

Of course he guessed. She didn’t want to think about  _ how _ he managed to reach that conclusion, but it wasn’t like she didn’t tell Mercie herself. Not that Mercie wanted to know. 

“But I highly doubt that  _ any _ of them were talking about us.” At least, that was what Felix  _ hoped _ . There was enough other gossip passing around the company that the fact that he and Annette had sex was the  _ least _ interesting thing going on. And even if Sylvain  _ had _ told Dimitri for reasons unbeknownst to Felix… Dimitri probably would have gone as red as Annette had when Byleth insinuated that she knew. 

“Why do you always have to be right?” Annette pouted. “We still on for Dorothea’s party tonight?”

_ Right. _ They were supposed to go to some cast party at the bar that night. Just the idea made Felix’s stomach churn. He’d been to Zanado’s with a Sylvain a few times since Glenn died, but Felix had chronically avoided any and all cast parties. But, this was different. Dimitri wouldn’t be there, and Annette  _ would. _ Maybe for a moment he could just relax, have a drink, and watch as his friends made fools of themselves after doing too many shots. 

Felix swallowed the lump in his throat. “Yeah. I’ll swing by your place at quarter to eight, then we can Uber there?” 

“I mean… That’s fine. But, I don’t have anything important to do until then. You could come over?” Annette held out her hand.

Felix’s fingers brushed against hers, his touch like electricity on her skin. He pulled her close against his body, still musky with post-rehearsal sweat, and kissed the top of her head. If ever Annette Fantine Dominic had swooned, it would have been in that moment.

“I’ve got something with Sylvain.” Felix watched Annette’s face fall. “But, I should be done by five.”

“Can you bring pizza?” she asked, her blue eyes puppy-dog wide. How could he say no to that face?

“Sure. Text me what you want.” He gave her another kiss, then turned to leave.

“I love you.”

Felix turned back, only to find Annette with her hands pressed over her face, likely hiding  _ another _ fit of fervid blushing. That made  _ him _ blush as well, and for a moment, he was certain that they’d both faint right on the sidewalk just from how embarrassed they both were.

“I didn’t mean to say that!” she blurted from behind her hands. 

Felix just chuckled, shaking his head while his heart pounded heavy in his chest. “I love you too, ‘Nette. See you at five.” 

—

Felix drummed his hands on his muscular thighs, trying to work out the nervous energy that was built up in his core. They were stuck at a red light, Sylvain behind the wheel of his too-flashy red convertible. 

“This is a bad idea,” Felix frowned. “Why did I let you talk me into this?”

“Because you know I’m right? Look, Dr. Arter is really good. She’s gonna call you on your bullshit, but  _ fuck _ , you need it.” Sylvain lightly punched Felix in the shoulder, returning to the wheel the second the light turned green.

Felix still wasn’t sure if he was okay with this. After he collapsed during rehearsal, Sylvain and Ingrid ganged up on him and told him that they were worried about him. Sylvain offered to get Felix in with his therapist, and Felix had reluctantly agreed. 

After all, he saw a huge turnaround in Sylvain since he started going. It used to be a constant back and forth, Felix and Dimitri and Ingrid calling and texting each other back and forth trying to help Sylvain every other weekend. The breakdowns, the suicide attempts. They had all breathed a collective sigh of relief when Miklan got arrested and Sylvain started seeing Dr. Arter. 

But Felix thought he was hardly in the same category as pre-medication Sylvain. He wouldn’t dare consider killing himself, not when he knew what it was like to be left behind after someone died. His breakdowns only inconvenienced himself. It wasn’t like he was constantly teetering on the edge… 

“Let’s just say I’m paying you back for all that you did for me.” Sylvain parked his convertible like a jackass, heavy over the line from one parking space into another.

“Annette said she loved me.”

Sylvain looked over at Felix. “And, what did you say?”

“I said it back.”

“Do you?”

Felix rubbed his sweaty palms on his thighs, his eyes focused on his boot laces. This was supposed to be a distraction technique, a way to throw Sylvain off of his rhythm so Felix could roll out of the car door and run as fast as he could away. Fuck Sylvain for never following the plan.

“I do.”

“Then, it’s not a problem.” Sylvain’s hand rested impatiently on the car door, waiting for Felix to move. When he didn’t, Sylvain frowned. “Are you nervous?”

“No.”

“Then get out of the car.” 

Felix stayed in place, his arms folded over his chest. “It’s not that easy, Sylvain.”

“Oh don’t even  _ fucking _ start. You think it was easy for me?” Sylvain took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’ll stay in the waiting room. I’m  _ right there. _ ”

“Fuck. Fuck you.  _ Fine.”  _

Felix wasn’t sure if this was going to be okay, but maybe it was a step in the right direction.

—

Annette was back in the studio, mainly because she realized that she had left her phone in the dressing room. She realized that once she reached for it to tell Mercie what had just happened and it wasn’t there. Her heart was pounding and it felt like the heavens had opened up and the Goddess herself had kissed her on the mouth. With tongue. 

The second it was back in her hands, her thumbs flew across the keyboard. This was huge.

**Annette:** So, I accidentally told Felix I loved him.

**Mercedes:** !!!

**Mercedes:** What did he say?

**Annette:** He said it back.

**Mercedes:** !!!

Phone in hand, Annette wandered down the hall, barely paying attention to where she was walking. Instead of making her way to the stairs, she went straight on autopilot, walking towards the door to Studio C. 

The sound of an unknown piece of music snapped her out of her trance and drew her to the viewing window. Most of the studios were equipped with two way mirrors, mostly so that people could observe without actually disturbing the dancers. 

Annette had expected to see one of the the other showcase  _ pas de deux _ rehearsals. There was still Dedue and Marianne’s  _ Day _ , Petra and Dorothea’s  _ Noon, _ and Hilda and Claude’s  _ Night _ to go through. It couldn’t be Mercedes and Sylvain’s  _ Dawn, _ because Sylvain was with Felix and Annette knew Mercie’s music by heart.

She stepped closer to the glass, only to find Byleth and Dimitri in the studio. The music paused for a second, and Annette wondered if they had noticed her peeking. However, she could hear Byleth’s voice even through the window.

“You don’t need to push yourself.”

“But I  _ want _ to.”

Byleth cupped Dimitri’s face in her hand, his remaining eye lolling shut the second her skin met his. He seemed to melt into her touch. Annette felt almost  _ dirty _ watching them, like she had walked in on them both naked. They were dancing, but it seemed more intimate than that.

The music started again, and Byleth rolled  _ en pointe, _ dancing over to Dimitri’s imposing form. Despite dancing under her for a month and a half, nearly two now, Annette had never actually seen Byleth dance in person. She was a force to be reckoned with. Every movement of hers commanded attention, every step perfect and graceful and strong. 

Dimitri, on the other hand, looked nothing like what she remembered him. When she saw him dance in  _ Swan Lake  _ years ago, she was enamored with his dancing. He was so princely, so elegant in everything he did. Now he was shaky, cautious, unsure. 

He pulled his leg up to  _ passe _ , but a shock of pain swept through his eye. He stumbled forward, and Byleth was barely quick enough to catch him. Dimitri and Byleth kneeled to the ground, Dimitri’s face buried in her chest. The music still played, drowning out whatever was being said. 

A pang of guilt rushed through Annette’s chest, but she couldn’t look away. Dimitri, once the star of the Seiros Ballet Company, now couldn’t even do a full  _ plié. _ This was who she and Felix loathed so much? They blamed him for their problems, but wasn’t he just as troubled? Couldn’t that have easily been her had her foot not healed properly?

Just as Annette was about to walk away, she caught one last movement out of the corner of her eye. Byleth’s lips were on Dimitri’s, and she was sure that was  _ not _ part of their dance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today's chapter is brought to you by the Ellie Goulding cover of The Cave. Here's the link if you haven't heard it. You should. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8UDhYWXBIY
> 
> Thank you for all the kind words that you've given this fic so far! I haven't responded to most of the comments because I'm a garbage person, but I seriously love and cherish each one of them. The more ridiculous, the better! 
> 
> I'm thinking about doing a companion piece to this, one that has an omitted scene. I'd like to keep this fic rated T, though it's a stronger T. Not quite a long island iced, but it's pretty buff. This T goes to the gym. However, I do want to write a spicy scene, so that's where the companion piece might come in. We'll see what happens. 
> 
> I keep forgetting to mention, but I got a twitter for fandom stuff. You can find me @Safraninflare


	9. One Hundred More Good Things About You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are turning around for Felix. He's in therapy. He's got Annette by his side. 
> 
> Will one little party set him back, or push him out of his comfort zone?

Felix’s body still buzzed with nervous energy, even several hours after his appointment with Dr. Arter. It wasn’t as horrible as he had built it up to be in his head. Fuck, it wasn’t even  _ bad. _ Sylvain was right, Dr. Arter  _ was _ good. But  _ fuck _ did he end up angry-crying on her couch, letting loose a lot of pent-up feelings that he didn’t even know he had harbored. 

He hated to admit when Sylvain was right, but Sylvain  _ was _ right. And Felix was glad that he had come with him, even if he had to listen to Sylvain bitch about his brand new parking ticket the entire way back to Felix’s place.

But he’d been at Annette’s for a while now. He ate pizza. They watched some more of that baking show she liked so much. He helped her pick out her outfit and listened to her grumble about trying to cover the hickey he gave her. It was all normal people, low stress shit, and yet he couldn’t seem to calm himself down.

Maybe it was the fact that he hadn’t been to a party since the night Glenn died, or maybe it was the prescription bottle of little white pills in his jacket pocket that was screwing with him so much. He agreed with Dr. Arter just to try them, and  _ fuck _ , Felix knew how much they helped Sylvain, but there was still that little naggy voice in the back of his head that just ate away at his stomach lining. Was he weak if he took them? Would his friends think of him differently? Would  _ Annette? _

He still hadn’t told her what he was really doing with Sylvain. It wasn’t that he was trying to keep it from her, or that he was embarrassed. He just didn’t know how to bring up the fact that he went to a therapist in casual conversation.

_ You look absolutely stunning. By the way I’m in therapy now and I’m agonizing over whether or not I should actually take these antidepressants she prescribed me. _

Despite the fact that he hadn’t said a word about anything that was currently bothering him, it seemed as if Annette picked up on his nervous energy. Or perhaps, it was her own.

“We don’t have to go to the party if you don’t want to,” Annette said as she looked down at her phone. “I can cancel the Uber.”

“You don’t need to cancel the Uber.” Felix sighed. He slipped a hand around her waist and pressed his forehead against hers. 

“I don’t want to pressure you. I know I said I really wanted to go, but I’d rather you be—”

Felix cut her off with a soft kiss, not caring if her lipstick transferred to his own mouth. “Annie, I’m okay.”

Maybe if he said it out loud, he would believe it.  _ I’m okay. _ Nothing is going to happen. Fuck, he went to tons of parties before that Nutcracker wrap, and the worst things that ever happened were on the night Dorothea made out with everyone in the room, and Hilda threw up in Glenn’s coffee pot.

Now that he thought about it, that night was also what led to Sylvain’s car meeting his ex’s golf club. 

_ I’m okay. _

The more he thought it, the more he believed.

—

“Hey!” Dorothea greeted, extending the  _ ey _ for way too long. They could barely hear her above the bumping music from inside, but thankfully her voice was predisposed to carry. “I’m so glad you guys could make it!”

She leaned over and gave both Felix and Annette a kiss on both cheeks, which gave both of them a full view the empty airplane bottle of pink Kinky shoved in between her breasts.  _ So _ , Annette thought,  _ it’s gonna be that kind of party. _

“We’re glad to be here!” Annette peered over at Felix, trying to gauge his comfort level. As much as she wanted to have fun, she was ready to bounce the second it became too much for him. However, he had what appeared to be a content look on his face. Not a smile, but not the normal resting bitch face that he favored. 

They wandered inside the house, and Annette was glad that she had dressed in layers. It was unusually cold for late February outside, but inside was boiling with the heat of many dancing bodies. After dropping off their coats in the closet labeled  _ Do not puke in here _ , they made their way to the kitchen, where Hilda was mixing something or other, and Marianne waited beside her. 

“Oh, hey. You want something? I’m really good at mixing drinks!” Hilda winked. “Or, Annie! You should  _ see _ the Jello shots Doro made! They’re  _ fishbowls… _ ”

She held up one of the little plastic cups, which was filled with a mix of Nerds, pink Jello, and topped with what looked to be a Swedish fish. They were positively adorable, but the last time Annette had a Jello shot, she ended up singing karaoke and falling face first off of a coffee table. 

“Fish water isn’t pink.” Marianne sighed. Hilda looked at her like she wanted to say something, but instead she just gave the blue-haired girl a smooch on the cheek. 

In that moment, Annette made peace with the fact that she was probably going to embarrass herself at some point during the night. “Yeah, I’ll take one.” 

Hilda handed her a container and took one for herself. 

“Bottoms up!” She tapped hers against Annette’s, and then they both sucked them down. 

The shot was outrageously sweet, with no distinct flavor other than  _ pink _ . It was what Annette would call  _ dangerous _ , because it would be surprisingly easy for her to suck down enough of them to add a dance routine to her sloppy karaoke. 

“Grab me a beer, Hilda.” Felix asked, surprising Annette. She saw him drink before at The Pasta Place, but with all the nervous vibes he was giving earlier, she just didn’t expect him to. 

“What do you say?”

Felix just stared at Hilda, who stared back. It didn’t look like either of them would dare to move, or to speak. Whoever blinked first would be the loser, and if Annette knew one thing about Felix, it was that he didn’t like to lose. Before either of them could budge, however, Marianne slipped a bottle in his hand, then dragged Hilda back out of the kitchen without saying a word. 

“You want an actual drink?” Felix pulled a magnetic bottle opener off of the fridge, and in a swift motion he popped the cap off. He took a sip, or maybe a swig? Annette couldn’t tell the difference.

“Um, sure?” She scanned the assortment of bottles and mixers that scattered the counter, but she couldn’t think of anything in particular that she wanted. “I didn’t know you knew how to bartend.”

“Glenn was way better.” Felix frowned, staring down at the red solo cup in his hand. 

“I went to see a therapist today.” The words just slipped out of his mouth before he could stop them, even though he barely had anything to drink. 

“What?”

“That’s what I was doing today. With Sylvain. I was chickenshit and made him come with me. And I know it was a good thing but I’m kind of fucked up about it, and I didn’t want to hide it from you.” He ran his hand over his face, unable to look her in the eye. 

Annette didn’t quite know what to do, or to say. Yes, it was a good thing that Felix was seeing a therapist. But she didn’t want to seem too eager, or to infantilize him. So, she did the one thing that she knew how to do and wrapped him in a hug. 

“I’m glad you told me. And, if you need someone to lean on, I’m your girl.” 

Felix’s lips curled into one of his rarely-seen smiles. She knew that the others in the company knew him as a prickly grump, but the Felix she knew was so soft, so vulnerable. And every time he smiled just for her it made her want to faint right then and there.  _ Goddess,  _ he was so gorgeous.

“You still want that drink?” he asked.

“Hit me!” 

Felix laughed. When he finished making her drink, he took a small sip and winced. “I think it’s sweet enough for you.” 

Annette took a swig of the vaguely pink drink. It was fruity, boozy, and as expected, amazingly sugary. “That’s perfect.”

She rose on her toes to give him a kiss on the cheek, which made him blush in return. He was always so cute when he blushed, though she knew he would deny if she pointed it out. 

“Fe! I didn’t think you’d come!” Sylvain half-stumbled into the kitchen, a red solo cup in his hand filled with fuck-knows-what. He threw his arm around Felix, pulling the smaller man into a hug. 

Felix rolled his eyes, but he didn’t pull away. Could he really be that grumpy with Sylvain after all he did for him? “Yeah, well. Annette’s never been to one of these.” 

“Is that it, hm? Or did you just miss us?” Sylvain had the biggest shit-eating grin on his face that Annette had ever seen. Maybe it was the drink in her hand, or maybe that pink-fishbowl-Jello-shot was stronger than she thought, but she couldn’t help but giggle.

“If I do a shot with you, will you shut up?” Felix glared. The bottle of whiskey was already in his fist, mid-pour. 

“That’s our Felix!” 

Annette sipped from her cup, watching as Felix and Sylvain threw back their whiskey shots. A smile played its way across her lips. She was happy to see Felix loosen up a little. While she hadn’t ever met the “old” Felix, she was pretty happy with the one that she  _ did _ know, the one that told her that he loved her and didn’t make fun of her if she set the kitchen on fire. 

“Hey Sylvain. Can I talk to you for a minute?” Annette asked.

Sylvain turned around to face her, the liquid in his solo cup sloshing as he moved. “Sure, ‘Nette. What’s up?” 

_ Fuck, _ she really wished that she had another one of thos Jello shots before she decided to do this. She took a long sip from her cup, maintaining eye contact with Sylvain the entire time.

“Look, I know you’re both gonna say that you’re just dance partners, or that you were just watching a movie, but if you hurt Mercie I promise I will personally  _ kick your ass, Sylvain.” _ The kitchen grew quiet for a moment, save for the sound of bumping party music in the background.

But after a long moment, Sylvain smiled again. “I’d like to see you try, Dominic.”

“Goddess, Sylvain. Don’t tempt her,” Felix grumbled.

“I kid, I kid. No.  _ Shit _ no. I’d rather get kicked in the nards with steel toed boots than do anything to hurt the angel that is Mercedes von Martritz.” 

“What were you saying about me?” Mercedes’ soft voice rang through the kitchen, her head resting on the doorway. She had a glass of white wine in her hand, and a sly smile on her face. 

Felix snorted. “That I’m glad that Sylvain finally made a move after years of pining.”

“I was not pining!” Sylvain slapped his drink down on the table with such a force that the liquid inside splashed onto the wood. 

Annette watched Mercedes, who seemed to be pleasantly amused by Sylvain’s little outburst. She sipped neatly at her wine glass, giggling at the rapidly blushing Sylvain. 

“Hey, you aren’t innocent either, Mercie.” Annette laughed. “How many times did you complain to me about him dating other girls?”

Mercedes opened her mouth, then closed it. She grabbed Annette’s wrist, and tugged her into the living room, right into the lion’s den.

—

One thing Annette figured out very quickly, is that she still had no control when it came to Jello shots. Especially ones that were neon pink and topped with candy. Thankfully it seemed like everyone else in the room was similarly buzzed, or at least that’s what the vodka brain was telling her. 

At some point Dorothea set up a karaoke machine, which led to her singing a frankly gorgeous version of Total Eclipse of the Heart. As the final notes dwindled to a close, she practically thrust the mic into Annette’s hand, and sauntered over to end up on Ingrid’s lap. 

Annette’s heart raced as she flipped through the selection on the machine, a newly-filled solo cup full of the pink punch in her other hand. Sure, she was  _ born _ to sing, but her legs were pleasantly wobbly. Hopefully this time she wouldn’t end up face first on the floor. But surely no one would boo her even if she picked a stinker of a song, right?

Actually, with the way that Lindhardt, the stage-manager-in-a-snuggie looked at her, she wasn’t even 100% sure of that fact. 

She scrolled through the list and lingered just a second too long on  _ Hot in Here _ . Lin responded by shaking his head slowly. So, she went a bit up and again hovered on  _ Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight) _ . This time, Linhardt nodded. 

Annette never thought that she’d give in to the demands of a grown ass man in a snuggie. But here she was at a party, several drinks in, ready to sing ABBA in front of a bunch of drunk ballet dancers. Fuck, she was  _ invincible. _

She hit the button, struck a pose, and prepared herself. As the opening notes of the song began, Annette sprung into action.

_ Half past twelve _

_ Watchin' the late show _

_ In my flat all alone _

_ How I hate to spend the evening on my own _

“Wow, go Annette!” Dorothea whooped from her spot draped over Ingrid. 

That spurred her on. If her singing was good, a little dancing couldn’t hurt either, right? She was born to dance, and she wasn’t just saying that because of pink drink. Her eyes wandered over to Felix’s, and it felt like her heart was going to explode in her chest. The way that he stared at her, the dopey looking grin on his face…

_ There's not a soul out there _

_ No one to hear my prayer _

Annette jumped on the balls of her feet, just a few times with the beat of the music. This was it, the moment.

_ Gimme, gimme, gimme a man after midnight _

_ Won't somebody help me _

_ Chase the shadows away _

She walked forward, the mic cord pulling taught as she stumbled toward Felix. Hand on his chest, sultry bedroom eyes… she was singing to him, pulling him closer so that she wouldn’t drag the entire karaoke machine across the room with her. 

The crowd whooped and hollered, and she swore that she heard Sylvain yell  _ “Get it, Fenis!” _

_ Gimme, gimme, gimme a man after midnight _

_ Take me through the darkness _

_ To the break of the day _

Annette grabbed Felix by the chest of his turtleneck and drew him into a drunk, sloppy kiss. She tasted like pink and sugar and the entirety of Candy Land, but Felix couldn’t care less in that moment. 

The microphone fell out of Annette’s hand and let out a resounding screech, only to be scooped up by Claude, who decided to pick up where she had left off. 

—

By the time the party wound down, it was nearly three AM. Annette and Felix sat in the back of their Uber with a bag of Taco Bell between them, thanks to the driver who was nice enough to bring them before they made it back to Annette’s little cottage. 

“I can’t believe that Hilda knew the entire  _ Hit Me Baby One More Time _ dance!” Annette said, for at least the sixth time, before taking a big bite of a Doritos Locos Taco. 

“If you think that’s impressive, you should see Marianne pop, lock  _ and _ drop it.” Felix let out a laugh, rich and full bodied, and realer than he had laughed in a long time. Maybe it was the booze running through his system, or the way that the moonlight reflected on Annette’s hair, but he couldn’t remember the last time that he had that much fun. 

Annette smiled. “I’d pay cash money to see that.” 

“Just wait until the final dress rehearsal. You’ll see all the crazy come out.” Felix looked out the window, watching as the houses went by. Red, blue, white… until the Uber driver stopped in front of Annette’s little yellow one. 

They got out of the car, Felix already primed to spend the night, and stood in the front yard, near the little white tree swing. Annette sat down on it, the world wobbling as she moved, and patted the spot next to her. When Felix sat down beside her, she tossed him a burrito and a handful of Diablo sauce packets. 

“I think I’m going to talk to my dad,” she said. Her fingers twitched at the straw in her Baja Blast, her mind a swimming mess of alcohol and party adrenaline. 

Felix nodded, his eyes wandering from the butt of his burrito to Annette. It was near-fucking-freezing outside. They probably should have gone in a while ago, but there was something relaxing about feeling the cool night air in his lungs.

“Do you want me to go with you?”

Annette shook her head, despite every bit of her still-drunk body telling her not to. “No. No, I think this is something I need to do on my own.”

“I’ll be a shoulder, then.” Felix poked her in the ribs. “I’d do anything for you, ‘Nette.”

“Anything?” Annette asked. She bat her eyelashes, her nose nearly touching his, as if she were going in for a kiss.

Felix nodded.

  
“Great, then we should get inside! Because I  _ really _ need to pee.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annette got a Doritos Locos Taco. And a Cheesy Gordita Crunch. Felix got a Beefy Five Layer Burrito and also a Cheesy Gordita Crunch.
> 
> You need to know this because I agonized over it. 
> 
> Today's chapter is brought to you by this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsgWUq0fdKk of a Literal Video for Total Eclipse of the Heart. If you have never seen this music video before, it's the weirdest freaking thing. Go watch it.
> 
> And as an FYI, this chapter was labeled in my outline with the note "Happy! You can do that, right?"
> 
> I had to delete big chunks because I kept sweeping back into angst. So I hope you enjoy dumb party shenanigans.


	10. There Exists a Countless Number of Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How can you hate someone
> 
> who was never
> 
> really
> 
> there?

Annette woke to the smell of bacon heavy in the air, which made her both hungry  _ and _ nauseous. Whatever was in the mix of pink drinks she consumed the night before had given her a hangover, one of the likes she hadn’t had since undergrad. She couldn’t remember the last time her head spun that much when she tried to stand, and she came in second place in a  _ pirouette _ contest back in summer camp.

She sat up slowly to try to combat the spins, only to catch a glimpse of Felix still passed out in her pink bedding. His hair was undone and thrown over his face, the blankets tangled and wrapped around him like vines in Barbie’s Magic Dream Jungle. She would come back to wake him, but only after she brushed her teeth. 

“Mercie, it smells so good in—” Annette cut herself off as she stuck her head in the kitchen, only to see Sylvain sleeping on their couch. She dropped her voice to a whisper, and shakily tiptoed closer to the blonde. “Did you make him sleep on the couch?”

Mercedes flipped a bit of bacon in the old cast-iron pan she got from her mother, her eyes wandering over to the sleeping ginger. “He insisted. He didn’t want me to think that he was using me.” 

“He’s going to wreck his back,” Annette gasped.

“He’ll learn.” Mercedes cracked one of signature smiles, the  _ I told you so, but you done fucked up _ , look that Annette was all-too-familiar with. “Grab the eggs from the fridge, please?”

“Sure. Want me to throw some toast in too?” Annette grabbed the carton of eggs from the fridge. The mantra of  _ “don’t drop them”  _ kept playing over and over in her head, even after she safely handed them off to Mercedes. 

“That would be lovely.” Mercedes half-turned from the stovetop, an egg still in hand. “Just remember what I told you about getting them out.”

“It was only a little spark, Mercie! How was I supposed to know using a butter knife to unjam the toaster would make it do that?” 

Before Mercedes could answer, Sylvain popped up from the couch, his red hair spiked and poofy from the position he slept in. “Do I smell bacon?”

“That, or you’re having a stroke.” Felix wandered in from Annette’s room, rubbing at his sleep-circled eyes. 

“Sylvain, are you having a stroke?” Mercedes giggled. 

Felix frowned. “If he is, please don’t give him mouth-to-mouth.”

“I don’t think you give mouth-to-mouth for a stroke.” Annette pushed the lever on the toaster. 

“I’m not having a stroke!” Sylvain stood up from the couch, his legs wobbling as he did so. “I’m gonna go take a piss.”

“Remember to put the seat back down!” Mercie yelled, before cracking another egg into her pan. “Felix, how do you like your eggs?”

“Sunny side up.” He shifted from foot to foot in the doorway, his own head throbbing from how many shots Sylvain convinced him to do the night before. “You have any coffee?”

“I was just about to start a pot,” Mercedes explained.

“I got it!” Annette twirled away from the toaster, barely dodging Mercedes’ hip as she made her way to the coffee maker. “By the way, there are spare toothbrushes under the sink in the guest bathroom.”

Felix nodded and headed back towards the bathroom, passing Sylvain on his way. The taller man shot him a pair of finger guns, then immediatly tripped over his own feet and stumbled down the hallway. 

At least no one had thrown up. Yet.

By the time Felix made it back into the kitchen, the table was already set with plates of eggs and toast, crispy bacon, glasses of OJ and mugs of coffee. There were even a few leftover packets of Taco Bell Diablo sauce placed next to his sunny side up eggs, likely because Annette and Mercedes didn’t have any real hot sauce. 

Fuck, he could have fallen in love with Annette all over again.

He slid into the chair next to her, giving her a small kiss on the cheek. Her phone was out on the table, displaying a text from  _ “Dad?” _ It was the same one she had stared at since she got it, still with no response.

“You gonna text him?” Felix asked.

Mercedes looked up from her mug of cream-and-sugar laden coffee. “Text who?” 

“I think I’m gonna finally talk to my dad.” Annette shrugged. She poked at a cheery yellow yolk with one of the tines of her fork, her appetite now suddenly gone. “And before anyone asks, I’m going alone.” 

“Should I be involved in this conversation?” Sylvain asked, his mouth still full of egg. “If it’s any consolation, my dad sucks ass too.”

“Welcome to the shitty dads club, I guess.” Annette shrugged. 

“Do we have jackets?” Sylvain smiled. Mercedes smacked him on the arm.

“Just tell him you’re open to get lunch. Tell him what days you’re available. Don’t let him drag you around.” Felix suggested. He was probably still too hungover to really give advice, but they were  _ all _ hungover.

Well, except for Mercedes, who responsibly drank a glass of water between every glass of wine, and paced herself so as not to move past the line of  _ Pleasantly Buzzed. _

Annette grabbed her phone and started typing, even though it felt like her stomach was going to roll its way out of her throat and onto the floor. She then turned the phone to the other three at the table, waiting for their approval before she finally hit send.

**Annette:** I’m free to grab lunch tomorrow at 12. 

They all stared at her phone as the three little dots appeared, then disappeared, leaving only a “Read 9:09 AM” in its place. 

“Jackass,” Felix muttered under his breath. This time it was Sylvain doling out the kick under the table, hitting him in the shin with a perfectly pointed toe. 

“It’s fine. It’s not like I actually expected him to—” Annette cut herself off when her phone buzzed. She immediately scooped it up in her hands, and almost dropped it into her coffee mug in the process.

**Gustave:** Knight’s?

Annette squinted, trying to figure out what in the actual fuck her father meant. 

“Knight’s. It’s a diner off of Indech,” Felix explained.

“Great curly fries,” Sylvain added, garnering him a kick from  _ both _ Felix and Mercedes.

**Annette:** Knight's at 12 tomorrow. 

Gustave only sent back a thumbs up emoji, which made Felix’s fucking blood boil. However, he promised that he wouldn’t interfere. This was Annette’s battle, and one she wanted to fight alone. However, that didn’t mean that he couldn’t be a rock for her when things inevitably went south.

Fuck, he really hoped that he wouldn’t have to punch her dad.

—

**Annette:** He’s not here yet.

**Mercedes:** Annie, you’re ten minutes early.

**Annette:** I know, but…

Annette wiped her palms on her leggings as she sat in the waiting area of Knight’s. The walls were covered in all sorts of kitsch, from old beer signs to photos of local celebrities eating in the restaurant.

It was the same kind of standard-issue fare that made the place homey, like you’ve been there a million times even if it was your first visit. There was probably a metaphor in there somewhere, about how she was meeting her dad for the first time in years at a place like that, but she was too wracked with anxiety to parse it out. 

She looked down at her phone again, watching as the time ticked from 11:56 to 11:57. 

**Annette:** Maybe this was a mistake.

**Felix:** ?

**Felix:** Are you okay?

**Annette:** Yeah, just nervous.

Before she could finish her next text, the bell above the door rang. It jostled her out of her thoughts, making her look up at the tall man in front of her.

“Father?” Annette rose from the bench, her phone clenched in her sweaty palm. 

“Table for two,” Gustave said to the hostess, barely acknowledging his daughter.

“Right this way.” The hostess nodded. She led them back to their table, past families eating lunch after Sunday Mass. 

Annette kept her head down as they weaved around happy, conversing people. Fuck, he was the one that agreed to meet with her, and he couldn’t even  _ acknowledge her? _ Anger was boiling in her bones, the kind of righteous fury that she figured Felix carried at all times.

The hostess brought them to a booth in the back and handed them a pair of menus. Gustave immediately looked down at his, bypassing any attempt to look at Annette while he figured out what he wanted to drink.

“Diet coke.” 

Annette immediately wanted to sink into the floor. This was a bad idea, a horrible idea. Maybe she should have brought Felix. Or Mercie. Or  _ fuck _ , even Sylvain. There was no way that her father could ignore her if she brought Syvlain Gautier, the Slut of Seiros to lunch with them. 

But, she didn’t bring Felix or Mercie or Sylvain. She wasn’t sitting there with Linhardt in his party snuggie, or Hilda chewing her gum, or Ingrid with her kind eyes. She was alone, and  _ Goddess _ did she feel like she was going to throw up.

“Hon, what did you want to drink?” The hostess’ concern snapped Annette out of her fog, forcing her to look back down at the menu.

“Hot chocolate, please.”

“Whipped cream?”

_ “Please,” _ Annette said with all the intensity of a jaded divorcée asking for a double shot at the bar. 

Annette watched as the waitress walked away, leaving her alone with her father in this hellscape of a diner. He was there, yes, but it felt like he was doing everything in his power to  _ not be _ , while still sitting across from her.

She cleared her throat, flipping through the section of the menu with all the different types of pancakes. “Dad. I’m glad you could meet with me today.” 

Gustave remained silent. It seemed like he was very interested in the meatloaf special, so interested that he couldn’t bother to even spare a glance at her. If she were Felix, there would already be yelling. It seemed like he couldn’t even get through a phone call with his dad without devolving into insults. 

But, she wasn’t Felix. She was small, and meek, and always tried to please others. Why would she raise her voice if it would make someone upset?

Then again, wasn’t he making  _ her _ upset?

“You know, I came to Serios because of you, right?”

Nothing. 

The waitress brought their drinks, and Gustave thanked her.  _ He thanked a total stranger,  _ but he couldn’t even look at Annette. 

“Why are you ignoring me?” She got a little louder. Her hands curled into fists under the table, though she knew she wouldn’t dare sock him in the jaw. She was a ballerina, for fuck’s sake, not a boxer. “Dad, I’m your  _ daughter!” _

Gustave ran his hand over his face. He was older than she remembered him from her childhood, but then again, years had passed. She couldn’t expect him to stay still when she moved forward. “Annette, not now.” 

“Not now?” Annette snapped. She narrowed her eyes on his, the same shade of stormy-sea blue as her own. However, his were colder,  _ deader. _ “If not now,  _ when _ , dad?”

“You were the one who wanted to talk, Annette.”

“And you agreed! You could have just not shown up, like you did for my dance recitals. My graduations. My  _ birthdays! _ Fuck—”

“Annette. Language.” Gustave frowned. 

She immediately swallowed down an apology. There was nothing for her to apologize to him for. Now of all times he wanted to act like a father? To scold her like a child in a restaurant with pictures of the food on the menu? 

“You know what’s the worst, though? I got used to it. I grew up not expecting anything from you. But mom? Mom  _ still _ waits for you to come home.” Her words were growing sharper, her tone more venom-laced.

“It’s not that simple, Annette.” Gustave gripped the edge of the table, his knuckles burning white. 

“From where I’m sitting, it looks  _ really _ simple, Dad. You fucked off to Fhirdiad for Dimitri Blaiddyd, and you didn’t give a shit about your wife and child!” She slapped her hands down on the table, making her father’s diet coke slosh over the sides of the glass. Sometime during her outburst she stood up, now hunched over the booth, glaring all the way.

If people weren’t staring before, they sure were now. 

“Watch your language!”

“Stop trying to scold me! You lost that right! You were never there, so don’t act like you have  _ any _ say over how I act!” Annette was so frustrated that she could cry. She hadn’t even touched her hot chocolate, and now all the whipped cream had melted down into a sad foam. 

“Fine, Annette. I  _ fucked off to Fhirdiad _ for Dimitri. Is that what you want to hear? You want me to tell you that I left, and I didn’t give half a damn about you, or your mother?” Gustave was seething. She could practically see the smoke coming out of his ears. “You want to believe that I wasn’t calling her every day? That I wasn’t fully planning on coming back before Lambert died?” 

“Oh, so now you claim that you were coming back? That you gave a crap?” Annette’s jaw hurt from clenching it so hard, her whole body tensed up with fight or flight adrenaline. She was going to have to take a shower and a nap when all this was over, because she was pissed and sweaty and the only good thing about crying is the sleeping that comes after.

“Dimitri needed a father!”

_ “I  _ needed a father!” Tears flowed from Annette’s eyes in a frenzied cascade, one after the other, like she was a rainforest of sorrow and frustration. Part of her was glad that Felix wasn’t there with her. He would have grabbed Gustave by the collar and punched him in front of the toddler poking at the cut-up hot dog on his high chair tray.

She slammed her hands down on the table again, her eyes screwed shut to try to staunch the flow of tears. “I needed a father. And instead, I got you.” 

“Annette—”

“Don’t.” She swatted his hand away as she slid out of the booth, then swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. It left a dark streak of mascara on her skin, but  _ fuck _ , she could not  _ make herself _ care. “Do yourself a favor, and call mom. But do  _ not _ call me.”

Annette stormed out of Knight’s without even ordering pancakes, and just as he always had, Gustave did not follow.

—

**Annette:** Fuck my dad.

**Annette:** Fuck him SO hard.

Annette sat in her car, keys thrown on the passenger’s seat next to her, and dialed Felix’s number. It rang once, twice…

“‘Nette? You okay?” Felix’s voice crashed over her like a wave, dousing the burning flame in her chest. 

That was a loaded question. How could she even attempt to answer. No, she wasn’t okay. She just had a screaming fight with her father in a diner full of the Sunday church crowd. She made an absolute  _ scene _ . Still, there was something inside her that felt relieved. Like she was a can of orange soda that was shaken for years, and she finally got to just  _ explode. _

“I’m not. Not right now. But I will be.” Annette sighed. She rested her head on the steering wheel, but accidentally beeped the horn with her face. “Fuck, I didn’t even get pancakes.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Felix said on the other line. “I’ll take you for pancakes. At somewhere that’s not Knight’s.”

“With chocolate chips?”

“You can get a hot chocolate too.”

Annette smiled. “You’ve got a deal, Fraldarius.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Kaerra and Marina for letting me bounce ideas off of them. I need constant validation or I immediately die. Like Tinkerbell. It's fine. Just clap your hands a few times or smash that kudos button. (Or leave a comment. I like comments. I think y'all are so funny and amazing. Please love me.)
> 
> Today's chapter is brought to you by pretty much all of Jonathan Young's covers. Somehow I was able to listen to music and write for once. Sometimes even instrumental music is too much for my brain.
> 
> It's almost midnight. I need to stop posting so late at night. 
> 
> Roast Gilbert in the comments or you're not a real blue lions stan.


	11. Empire of Dirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix's life is on the upswing.
> 
> Dimitri's is on the decline.

**Sylvain:** Do you think I should get Mercie roses for our date?

**Felix:** Ask Ingrid.

**Sylvain:** Ingrid said “Ask Felix.” 

**Felix:** Do I look like I know jack shit about roses?

**Sylvain:** I don’t know! You have a girlfriend?

**Felix:** And you’ve fucked half of Garreg Mach. 

**Sylvain:** ):<<<<

**Felix:** Annette would tell you to buy the fucking roses.

**Sylvain:** Annette’s my new best friend.

**Felix:** Good.

Felix placed his phone down on the bathroom counter. Ever since he and Annette had nailed their pas de deux, they had cut down their rehearsals to only the official ones with Byleth overseeing. However, that didn’t mean that he stayed in bed all morning. He was usually up by seven to meet Annette for coffee. 

Even if they weren’t dancing all day, he still wanted to see her smile every fucking morning. He loved how she held his hand in line, how she smiled and said  _ “please” _ at least five times while ordering her super sugary drinks. Every time she laughed, he was sure that his heart would explode in his chest. 

Things were very, very good for Felix Hugo Fraldarius. 

Unusually good. Fuck, he was almost certain that he was going to get the lead in  _ Manon _ , and the auditions weren’t until the following week. He felt strong, like nothing could take him down. 

So when he met Annette at the bakery by the studio, she was not surprised to see him with the beginnings of a smile on his face.

“Trenta strawberry creme frappuccino?” Felix asked.

Annette wrinkled her nose, her eyes already wandering towards the pastry case. “Even if we could get them here, I think I’m Trenta-ed out. I wouldn’t say no to one of those apple turnovers, though.”

She tangled her fingers through his and guided him towards the counter. Even though they’d been to this specific bakery before, she was grinning from ear to ear like a kid in a candy store. That was something that Felix loved about Annette; no matter how mundane something was, she could find a way to be head over heels excited about it.

“Can we get an apple turnover, a jalapeño sausage kolache, a black coffee, and whatever she wants to drink.” Felix pointed his thumb at Annette, who seemed lost in the sea of menu options.

“Nutella mocha. Extra whip.” 

How she didn’t have diabetes yet, Felix didn’t know.

They sat down at a table by the front window, so that Annette could point out any dogs that happened to walk by. It was early March now, though Spring still seemed far away in the town of Garreg Mach. Little bits of dirt-colored snow sat piled on the edges of the sidewalk, and there still was a cold chill in the air. Still, it was warmer than Fhirdiad, and that was all he could really ask for. 

“How’s Mercedes?” Felix asked. 

“Thinking—” Annette swallowed the bite of turnover she had nearly choked on. “Thinking about getting a cat.”

He nearly snorted. “Should I warn Sylvain?”

“She’s not getting rid of him and replacing him with a cat!” She laughed so hard that Felix was sure she was going to fall out of her seat. He could feel his cheeks start to burn with the weight of a grin, and if Sylvain were there, he’d accuse Felix of needing to flex those muscles more.

“Speaking of Sylvain, he’s apparently planning to get her roses.” He shrugged.

“No roses.” Annette sipped from her mug of mostly-Nutella-and-maybe-some-coffee. “Roses are overdone and kind of bougie. Aster flowers. Purple ones. If he can’t find those, calla lilies. Trust me.” 

**Felix:** Not roses.

**Sylvain:** ??

**Felix:** Annie says aster? Calla lilies if you can’t find them.

**Sylvain:** Yeah, Annette’s my new best friend.

**Sylvain:** Tell her we’re getting shirts made.

Felix put his phone down for the second time that day, but he couldn’t help but feel that everything was going to be okay. 

—

“Fraldarius! I know you can get that leg higher!” Jeralt barked as Felix finished a kick. He had been taking private lessons with Jeralt sporadically for years now, but as the  _ Manon _ auditions drew closer, he had ramped up their frequency. 

“Yes, sir.” He always came out of the sessions drenched in sweat, every muscle aching, but a better dancer than before. After all, Jeralt Eisner was a legend. Even his daughter, Byleth, couldn’t fully measure up to his poise and skill. 

The music cut off, replaced by Jeralt’s gruff voice saying, “From the top.” 

Jeralt had choreographed this piece just for him, to be featured in the new promo for the company’s new season of shows.  _ He _ was picked, not Dorothea, not Sylvain,  _ him. _ And  _ fuck _ if that didn’t feel good. 

The opening notes of  _ Hurt _ began to play, pulling Felix back into the zone. He could do this. He could fucking  _ soar _ and get that leg so high that it could clock Dimitri himself in the face. 

_ I hurt myself today _

_ To see if I still feel _

_ I focus on the pain _

_ The only thing that's real _

The song hit him in a different way than it had when Jeralt had first taught him the choreography. He felt it now in his core, a reminder of the steps he was taking to getting better. Every  _ plié _ felt stronger, every turn infused with more emotion. 

_ And you could have it all _

_ My empire of dirt _

_ I will let you down _

_ I will make you hurt _

He made it through the high kick, earning a small grin from Jeralt. It bled into a turn, spinning into a split that had him on the ground. The lyrics pounded him from all sides, picking bits of flesh from his bones. Is this how he would have ended up if he hadn’t taken Sylvain’s advice?

That Felix still lived inside him, burrowed under his skin. He could feel him tremble, begging for release. But that wasn’t what he wanted anymore. He didn’t want to feel numb, or only pain. The idea of only having a pile of fucking dirt to give Annette made him sick to his stomach. She deserved so much more than that. 

_ Beneath the stains of time _

_ The feelings disappear _

_ You are someone else _

_ I am still right here _

Tears pricked at the corners of Felix’s eyes as he completed the next turn sequence. The emotions boiled inside of him like one of Annette’s attempts at cooking. Uncontrolled. Too big. He couldn’t settle on one meaning to this passage. Was he thinking about Glenn? Or was it  _ Dimitri?  _

He danced his way through the next lines, his heart aching in his chest. Part of him wished that Jeralt was recording this, because Felix could  _ feel _ every emotion on his face. This was the most invested he’d felt in a dance since his Dusk  _ pas de deux _ finally clicked. It was if everything else had gone away. Nothing else mattered but him and the dance.

_ If I could start again _

_ A million miles away _

_ I will keep myself _

_ I would find a way _

Felix dropped to his knees as the final verse played. The lyrics rang through his chest as he slipped through the last bit of choreography, his mind lost to the music entirely.

“That ain’t half bad, kid.” Jeralt crossed his arms over his chest, but the twitch of a grin on the corner of his lip gave it away.

“The fuck does that mean?” Felix asked, his water bottle already halfway to his lips. He was going to have to run home and shower before his rehearsal with Annette, at least if he didn’t want to smell like a petting zoo while dancing with her.

“You know I’m not one for gushing. But it was good. You  _ felt _ the music.” Jeralt shrugged, then turned to grab his things. “Be proud of yourself.”

And he was.

—

It wasn’t fair. 

This wasn’t the life that Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd had imagined when he was a little boy, when Gustave was first teaching him how to pirouette. He dreamed of being a star, of dancing on the greatest stages across Fódlan. Garreg Mach, Fhirdiad, Enbarr, Derdriu… 

It wasn’t event that far out of his grasp. His father was Lambert, the king of the Fhirdiad ballet. This was his legacy, the kingdom he was to own. No one else could kick as high as he could, could turn with such grace. The only one that even dared to tiptoe close was Glenn Fraldarius, but—

Well, they’d never see the end of that battle, Dimitri and Glenn. 

He lay curled up on the floor of the Eisners’ home studio, Byleth by his side. Her fingers danced in his hair, smoothing it down as he wept. His body writhed with the force of air being sucked from his chest, the darkness having took over long ago.

“I’m sorry, Glenn…” he mumbled under his breath, his lone blue eye staring intently at nothing. 

Maybe Felix was right. Maybe it was all his fault. Maybe if he hadn’t gotten drunk like that, maybe if he had just stayed home, maybe, maybe,  _ maybe. _

Glenn would still be alive. He and Ingrid would be married and maybe she’d be ridiculously pregnant and still waddling around the control room so that every light and cue on stage was spotless. 

Felix wouldn’t hate him. He wouldn’t stare daggers any time their paths crossed. They could still be friends, still dance together.

He could still dance. 

“I just want to dance with you again, beloved,” Dimitri cried. Maybe that was the worst part of this whole thing. He had let  _ Byleth _ down. Byleth, who deserved the moon and stars, Byleth who retired from the stage right after his accident. She danced the Nutcracker, then took off her pointe shoes and never returned to the stage.

“That’s not important, Mitya,” Byleth cooed into his sweat-soaked hair. “You don’t need to hurt yourself for my sake.” 

He shot up from his position on the floor, framing Byleth’s body with his. His forehead was pressed to hers, slick and sticky. “I want this, Byleth. I  _ need _ this.” 

Byleth cupped his face in her hand, her thumb coasting over the incline of his cheekbone. She was so beautiful to him, so radiant, like an angel. An angel who could shield him from the constant whisperings of ghosts, of the has beens and the what-ifs that plagued him. 

“They hate me.” Dimitri shook his head. “No. Felix hates me. The others? They pity me.”

There were no other words that he could use to describe the sad stares the other dancers gave him. After all, he was their greatest fear, a career ended in the blink of an eye, a promising future gone too soon. Many of them would rather die like Glenn then live like him, broken, unable to do the one thing he was born for. 

A kingdom crumbled to ashes at his feet. 

“Mitya.” Byleth rested her head against his chest, the scent of her jasmine shampoo tickling his nostrils. “I will never pity you. I will  _ never _ give up on you.” 

She said that now, but how long could she keep that promise? 

After all, he intended to love her until her flesh fell from the bone. 

—

“You excited?” Annette asked through a mouth full of hair pins. She was on her third try of getting Mercedes’ fluffy, thick hair into the right style, and if she didn’t love her best friend so much, she would have given up before she started. 

“Yes?” Mercedes played with the hem of her skirt. “Nervous too.” 

“Well, remind him that if he even thinks about—” 

“Annie, I don’t think you could kick his ass if you tried.” Mercedes sighed. She picked up one of the hair pins and affixed a lock that Annette had missed.

“I’ll find a way. No one makes my Mercie cry!” Annette grabbed the can of hairspray and double-checked which way the nozzle was facing before she sprayed down Mercedes’ hair, lest she glue her eyes shut. Again. 

“I’ll make sure he knows.” Mercie wrapped Annette up in a warm, vanilla-scented hug, then grabbed her purse from the floor. “I’ll be home by eleven!” 

“If you aren’t, I’ll assume you’ve been murdered!” Annette called. 

She heard the door close behind her friend, signaling that she had the whole house to herself. It had been a bit since she was just  _ alone _ , probably since she left Fhirdiad, really. She really bounced back and forth between Mercedes and Felix, and the silence was almost eerie. 

“Maybe Dorothea wants to grab drinks?” Annette mumbled to herself as she pulled her phone out. She didn’t really know the  _ prima _ well, but she seemed nice, and she could sing like it was nobody’s business. Even if Annette wasn’t really a bar girl, maybe they could make it a thing? Hilda probably liked to drink too. 

Before she could even begin to text  _ anyone _ , however, her phone began to buzz. She didn’t pay attention, just swiping to answer and bringing her phone up to her ear.

“Hello?” she asked.

“Annette…” Gustave’s voice came from the other end, freezing Annette to her core. “I just want to talk.”

“Well, I don’t.” Annette hung up the call and turned her phone to Do Not Disturb. 

Maybe she was just better off drinking alone in her little house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boy howdy was writing this a roller coaster. 
> 
> To clarify. Felix is dancing to the Nine Inch Nails version of the song. I listened to both this and the Johnny Cash version and thought that the NIN one worked better for Felix. No, he is not dancing to the Kermit the frog version. Yes, that exists. 
> 
> Initially, he was going to dance to a different song, inspired by a video I saw, then I found out that the dancer in that video is a nazi. I mention this so I can make sure to say FUCK NAZIS. So instead I went hunting for a different song, but didn't have a dance in mind.
> 
> Also, Annette did not want to cooperate this chapter, so you got Dimitri instead. I am not sorry.


	12. Little by little, my dream draws closer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annette has always hated auditions.
> 
> Felix has always excelled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This goes out to the bitches in the romance novels.

Auditions always made Annette’s skin crawl. Despite her talent as a dancer, dancing in front of people for the sole purpose of them deciding whether or not to put you in their show made her feel like she was the suckiest ballerina in the entire world. Normally, her anxieties only came from her performance. This time, though? It brought along a whole bunch of baggage.

The auditions for the Summer show,  _ L'histoire de Manon _ , marked the beginning of the end for the Spring Charity Showcase  _ pas de deux _ . Soon, she and Felix wouldn’t be dancing together all day every day. 

He’d get the lead in the show, because he was  _ Felix Fraldarius _ , and he’d be dancing alongside someone like Dorothea. Someone tall, and pretty, and who could  _ jeté _ higher than Annette could ever dream.

Not that Annette was threatened by Dorothea romantically. No, Annette knew Felix had no interest in her. However, she was threatened by Dorothea’s dancing. If anyone was going to get the female lead, it would be her. Annette would just be relegated to the  _ corps _ as usual. 

And that was what was under Annette’s skin. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she and Felix were part of a showmance. The moment they stopped existing solely in the other’s orbit, everything could fizzle out and she’d be left crying on the couch while Mercie tried to give her ice cream.

But, she couldn’t think about that now. 

Byleth, Jeralt, and Seteth were seated at a long table at the front of the room. By the way Jeralt nearly missed when Annette tried to hand him her resume and headshots, she assumed that he was hungover. In fact, everyone at the table  _ but _ Seteth looked hungover. Great. It was fine. She could do this.

“Hi, I’m Annette Fantine Dominic, and I’ll be auditioning for the show—” she paused, hoping that she wouldn’t choke on her French pronunciation.  _ “L'histoire de Manon.” _

She thought she sounded like she was choking on a bird, but none of the three in the front of the room seemed to be remarkably horrified by the way that she most certainly butchered the title. Maybe everything would be okay. All she had to do was smile. 

Smile, first position—

Seteth cleared his throat. “Thank you, Miss Dominic. Please begin.” 

Okay, she could do this. She’s done this a million times before. Annette was  _ born _ to dance. Well, not really. She was born to like, eat and sleep and maybe scream. Right, she’s supposed to be focusing on her dancing.  _ Rond de jambe, fouetté.  _ She’s done this routine so many times. It’s a simple audition piece. It’s  _ fine. _

Maybe it’s not fine. Was she a little wobbly on that turn? Oh, what if they think her foot looks weird? Does it look weird? Mercie said it didn’t look weird, but since she got out of the boot the last time every time it’s about to rain it feels weird. Is she pointing her toes enough? Is she pointing them  _ too _ much?

“Thank you, Miss Dominic,” Seteth said. 

And just like that, it was over.

She looked at Byleth, trying to suss out her expression, but she was stone faced as usual. Jeralt, whose habits she had less knowledge of, was similarly unshaken. And then there was Seteth, who looked like he was going to murder her in her sleep. 

Oh god, were they making fun of her? Would they all group up and laugh about how much she sucked?

Annette could feel her fall back to the  _ corps de ballet, _ complete with the crash landing at the bottom. Her stomach churned as she left the studio, her hands shaking. 

“Good luck, Dorothea,” she mumbled under her breath as she made her way back to her car.

—

Felix strutted into the studio like he owned the place, his head held high, his posture impeccable. This audition was a battle for him, and he wouldn’t go home without a victory clutched in his grasp. 

He shook Jeralt’s hand, then Byleth’s, then Seteth’s, before leaving his resume and headshots on the table. Then, he made his way to the center of the room. If he was nervous—which he wasn’t—they wouldn’t be able to tell. His amber eyes were narrowed on the prize, the sole thing he had been chasing after for years.

“My name is Felix Hugo Fraldarius, and I’ll be audition for the part of  _ des Grieux _ .” Felix readied himself, waiting for the music to play. 

The first notes played, and Felix slid into the dance like he was made only to perform this one piece. He was bold, graceful… Elegant, and  _ strong. _ That last private with Jeralt definitely helped him with the lifts on his jumps, allowing him to soar to new heights.

He was so encompassed in his dance that he almost didn’t hear Seteth’s voice over the swell of the music, saying, “Thank you, Mr. Fraldarius. That’s enough.” 

There was the barest twinge of a smile on Byleth’s lips, and while Felix wasn’t a superstitious person in the slightest, he took that as a good sign. When he saw similar expressions on Jeralt and Seteth’s faces, he thought that he would float through the ceiling and soar to the heavens because he just died right there. 

Fuck, Felix Fraladarius was on top of the world.

—

**Sylvain:** Getting sushi with Mercie tonight.

**Sylvain:** Wanna do a double date?

**Felix:** I thought Annette was your best friend.

**Sylvain:** Shit you right.

**Sylvain:** Annie says Tokyo Dream at six.

And that was how Felix and Annette wound up at Garreg Mach’s best sushi restaurant, sitting across a table from Sylvain and Mercedes on a Tuesday night. 

Despite the fact that Annette had a comically large mango bubble tea next to her, she didn’t feel excited, not one bit. She played with her straw in the cup, swirling it around the bottom to dislodge the boba pearls in an attempt to keep her mind from wandering. 

However, it didn’t work. She still had no appetite. She couldn’t even be bothered to fight Mercie off, and let her take the bits of pink pickled ginger from her plate without even a peep. 

Annette thought this would be fun. A real double date with her best friend! She had only obsessed about this very scenario since she was a teenager, but the timing had never been right. She should be ecstatic, over the moon, and yet she kept poking at the same bit of salmon in her Cethleann roll while she avoided eye contact with everyone in the the damn restaurant. 

“And so I said—” Sylvain began, but her brain blocked out the noise, her racing thoughts the only thing keeping her focus.

_ This isn’t going to last. _

_ Felix will move on. _

_ You weren’t good enough anyway. _

Her foot started to ache, though she knew it was just a phantom of an injury past. Perhaps it would rain soon, or maybe she  _ did _ really hurt herself again. Maybe Felix will leave her sooner rather than later, once he’s realized that she’s useless to their—

“What do you think, ‘Nette?” Felix asked. 

Annette stared. Silence rolled over the table like a heavy evening fog, burying everything in its wake. She poked a chopstick through the pile of bright green wasabi on her plate, everything else untouched. 

“I’m sorry, what were we talking about again?” Nausea welled in the pit of her stomach. No, she didn’t think she’d throw up in the middle of Tokyo Dream, but  _ no, _ she couldn’t fully rule out the possibility either. She grabbed the edge of the table and pushed her chair out as she stood, her legs shaking. “I think I need some air.” 

Annette stumbled out of the restaurant into the cold night air, not bothering to notice that it had started to pour while they were in the restaurant. The rain came down in heavy curtains, soaking her hair and clothes, but she didn’t care. 

Then again, if she got pneumonia, she’d  _ really _ let everyone down. She could dance on a bad foot. She’s done it before, and she’ll do it again. However, she  _ cannot _ dance with lungs full of fluid. 

She turned to go back inside, but instead of making it to the door, she ran straight into Felix’s now-damp chest. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, his hand already coming to smooth down her hair. 

“Yeah.” Annette swallowed. Despite the fact that Felix was there, that he had  _ run out in the rain to catch her _ , she couldn’t think clearly over the doubt in her heart. After all, her father was supposed to love her above all else, and he left too.

“Annette.” Felix held her at arm’s length, his amber eyes gazing deep into hers. “I know you’re lying. You’re not okay!”

He grabbed her hand, but she immediately pulled back.

“I’m fine, Felix,” she snapped. It was as if a shard of ice had consumed her heart, its rime spreading throughout her body until she felt like one small nick would make her shatter into a million, billion pieces.

Felix clenched his hands into fists, his chest shaking as the rain pounded heavily on his back. He was soaked to the bone on a sidewalk in front of a sushi restaurant in March, practically begging the woman that he loved to tell him what was wrong, to open up.

To do the same thing that he himself was afraid of doing for so long.

“Is it about Gustave?” he asked. 

She shook her head.

“Is it about me? Did I do something to hurt you?” 

Again, she shook her head. 

“Then what the fuck is it, Annette?” Maybe this was a task better suited to Mercedes’ strengths. Maybe he shouldn’t have followed her outside, but  _ damnit _ there was no way he was going to let her slip through his fingers, not when he finally had her close.

“I don’t…” she choked on her words, her tears lost in the melancholy of the falling rain. “You’re so much better than me, Felix. The showcase will be over soon, and you’ll find someone new to dance with, and you’re realize that you didn’t ever need me.” 

Her words tumbled from her mouth before she could stop them, and they hung in the air like a thick stage curtain between the two of them, clearly delineating where she ended and he began. A line in the sand, a clear divide.

Felix ran a hand down his damp face, shaking his head as he stepped past the imaginary boundary, falling back into her orbit. His lips met hers in a feverish kiss. She tasted like rain, and sadness, and the sweet sugar from the few sips she took of her mango boba tea. 

Annette broke away from the kiss, her eyes glassy with tears.

“Don’t.” Felix swallowed. “Do you really think that I’m like that?” 

She thought about it for a moment. According to Mercedes, Felix hadn’t seriously dated  _ anyone _ since before she met him. He wasn’t like Sylvain, hopping from tutu to tutu—though she  _ hoped _ he planned to settle down now that he was with her best friend in the entire world. Maybe Felix  _ was _ right. Maybe this wasn’t about him at all.

“No,” Annette finally admitted. “I don’t.”

“I don’t mince words, ‘Nette, and I don’t lie about shit like this. When I said I loved you, I fucking  _ meant _ it.” Felix balled his hands into fists by his sides. “I love to hear your ridiculous songs. I love you enough to follow you outside in the rain while my idiot best friend is probably stealing sushi off my plate.”

Annette flew into his arms, burying her face in his soaked turtleneck. She pulled him so close that she could hear his heart race under her ear, enveloped in the aroma of pine and leather. 

“I love you too, Felix,” she cried. “I’m sorry I’m a big, dumb idiot.” 

“You don’t need to apologize, Annie. Come on. You left your bubble tea inside.”

“Oh  _ shit, _ you’re right!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made a whole ass meme for last chapter and I completely forgot to post it. 
> 
> https://i.imgur.com/ixP1W7D.png
> 
> Wow I hope you like crying in the rain tropes because I know I do! 
> 
> Thank you again for all the comments. I do read and love each one, I just haven't responded to most of them because I feel like a dummy crying and saying thank you all the time. I love y'all, and thank you so much for reading and enjoying.
> 
> I literally Was Not going to write this at all. It was going to stay stuck in my ideas folder forever. I mean, the original file name for this fic was "Ballet AU that I'm never going to write." I got inspired after I binged all of Hard Rock Heroes, and I was like "I want to write something this good."
> 
> I definitely haven't made that mark, but this is the most motivation I've had to write in months. Now I'm just gushing. I'm sorry. I'm not crying, you're crying.


	13. It's Like the Night Sky Knows Everything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A family can be blood, or a family can be those you've collected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Longer update today, but I'm really happy with a lot of this chapter. I hope y'all enjoy it too. 
> 
> Again, thank you to Mimimirai and Kaerra for letting me rant while I wrote.

“Oh how I love to make spaghetti, I cook it ‘till it’s ready. Add some basil to the sauce, a touch of garlic, it’s the boss!” Annette sang as she seasoned a big pot of marinara. “Don’t forget a pinch of salt, then I’ll—” She cut herself off when Felix’s phone started to buzz on the counter. 

“Can you grab that? I’ve got butter hands.” Felix held up one of the slices of garlic bread he was working on, which was enough to get Annette to leave her sauce post.

“Felix Fraldarius’ phone, Annette speaking!” 

There was silence on the other line Then, she heard breathing, and her mind immediately jumped to horror movies, and Annette Fantine Dominic knew very well that she would not survive very long in a horror movie. But then the breathing shifted to a soft, melodic voice that she was familiar with.

“Annie, it’s Mercie. Is Sylvain with you and Felix?” 

It was very obvious to Annette, as she had known Mercedes von Martritz for many years, that something was wrong. Mercie was someone who tried her hardest to be strong for everyone around her, but even she had her tells. The little quiver in her voice, the way that she was pausing to carefully choose her words. There was no doubt about it. 

“No, he’s not here. Is everything okay?” Annette asked, her palms starting to sweat. “Did you and him get into a fight?” 

“No, I—”

“One moment, putting you on speaker. Felix has butter fingers.” Annette pressed the button on the phone and placed it back on the counter. The call was for Felix after all, so she felt that he should be listening.

“Felix, Sylvain got a phone call and he left, and he hasn’t been back. I can’t find him, and he’s not answering his phone,” Mercedes explained, this time not beating around the bush. She spoke a little bit faster, her tone a little bit more panicked than when she told Annette. 

“Is his car still there?” Felix spent way more time than needed wiping the butter off of his hands, his own mind now racing. It had been a while since he had to go chasing after Sylvain in the dark, but the ability to think like an emotional Sylvain hadn’t left his brain.

“Yes, it’s still here.”

“And you’re at the house?”

“Yes.”

“We’ll be there in ten minutes. Stay outside.” Felix turned off the stove and grabbed his keys off of the counter, a kind of fire in his eyes. “Annie, keep texting Mercedes. I’m going to call Ingrid.” 

He dialed Ingrid’s number as they ran down the stairs and out to the cold to get into Felix’s car. However, after four tries, he still couldn’t get ahold of her. There was another option, but  _ fuck _ he didn’t like it.

“Should I, or shouldn’t I call Dimitri?” Felix asked at a red light, his hands gripped tight on the wheel, as if that would will it to change colors and he’d be able to find his idiot of a sort-of-best-friend before he hurt himself. 

Annette chewed on her lip, unsure of what to say. She wasn’t too psyched about the prospect of Dimitri joining them, but at the same time, Dimitri had the same amount of knowledge as Felix did when it came to tracking down Sylvain.

“I think you should call.”

Felix nodded, handing his phone off to Annette so that he could focus on driving. It rang once, twice, then clicked to life.

“Felix?” Dimitri’s voice came from the other line.

“Look, I didn’t want to call you, but Ingrid’s not picking up. Sylvain ran off again and Mercedes is freaking the fuck out, and we need to find him.” If Felix wasn’t driving, he’d be pacing. Pacing was good in these types of situations, because it helped him think. Staying still made him anxious. Movement? Movement was good.

“I’ll be right there.” Dimitri hung up the phone, plunging the car back into tense silence once more. 

“Are you going to be okay?” Annette looped a lock of pumpkin-colored hair around her finger. “With Dimitri there.”

“I’m fine,” Felix said in a way that made Annette wonder if he was actually fine or not. He gripped the steering wheel tighter, his knuckles burning white. “It’s not about me right now. I don’t know what the fuck Sylvain is thinking, but we have to stop him from doing something stupid.” 

Annette shifted in her seat. She crossed and uncrossed her legs, looked out the window, looked back at Felix. Her mind raced as she tried to figure out what the right thing to say was. “Does this happen… often?” 

“Not so much anymore. Which means something’s really fucked him up.” Felix street parked the car, not bothering to attempt to be straight. If he got a parking ticket, fuck it—he could just pass it off to Sylvain. 

“Annie, Felix. I’m glad you’re here.” Mercedes was already on the lawn, a light shawl wrapped around her shoulders to try to keep out most of the night chill. 

Before they could respond, a black Lexus pulled up behind Felix’s civic, barely avoiding his bumper. Even though he couldn’t see through the tinted windows, Felix knew Dimitri Blaiddyd’s car anywhere. 

“I’m sorry I’m late, I came as quickly as I could,” Dimitri said as he scrambled out of his car. Felix nearly made a snide comment, but he decided to refrain. There was no point in starting an argument when he knew that they had to find Sylvain before it got too dark.

“Should we split up?” Annette asked. “Maybe in groups of two? Buddy system?” 

Well, splitting up never worked for Scooby Doo, but in this instance, Felix agreed.

Dimitri nodded. “I’ll go with—”

“I’ll take Dimitri. Mercie, you go with Felix?” Annette suggested. It was an easy solution, one that she made on the drive there. The last thing they needed was Felix biting Dimitri’s head off. 

Felix bit his lip. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go with Mercedes, but leaving Annette alone with Dimitri made his stomach roil. Not that she wasn’t safe with Dimitri. Honestly, Felix was more worried that Dimitri wasn’t safe with  _ Annette _ . Despite telling him that she was fine over and over, he could see that she was still bugged by the shitty lunch she had with her dad.

She flashes him a smile that makes his chest tighten. It’s a silent message a  _ “I promise I won’t say anything stupid.” _

“We go left, you go right,” Mercedes said.

“Keep your phones on,” Dimitri added.

And with that, the two pairs split off into the night in search of one Sylvain Jose Gautier. 

—

“I’m sorry that you got dragged into this,” Dimitri said as he shone his flashlight down an alleyway.

“I wouldn’t say I got dragged into it.” Annette shrugged. Though, part of her mourned the spaghetti that she wasn’t currently eating. She wished that she had grabbed something to tide her over until they found Sylvain, but there was no time to double back now. “Sylvain’s my friend too now.”

“Yes, I suppose so.” Dimitri grew quiet, his one crystal blue eye scanning the darkness for any sign of life. 

Annette wanted to fill the silence, but what could she say? Sorry you can’t dance anymore? Gee, at least the eyepatch makes you look cool? Why did my dad fuck off to Fhirdiad and leave me but wanted desperately to give you a father figure? 

No, none of those were right. This was about Sylvain, not about the dull ache she got in her chest every time she thought about her father spending time with Dimitri. 

But, she was Annette Fantine Dominic, and she had never been able to keep her stupid mouth shut. 

“So, um. You were trained by my dad, right?” Annette asked, even though she knew full well what the answer to that question was. 

Dimitri raised an eyebrow, still scanning the dark for any sign of anyone. “Yes. Gustave was a fantastic teacher. I’m surprised he never brought you to Fhirdiad. I assume it would have been easier to have both of his pupils in the same studio.” 

Annette wanted to sink straight through the sidewalk, or launch herself immediately into the sun. Dimitri didn’t  _ know? _ Her father left her for him, and yet Dimitri was absolutely  _ clueless? _ The puzzle pieces weren’t connecting properly in her head, a square peg desperately trying to force itself into a round hole.  _ Does not compute. _

“Oh,” she mumbled, wishing that she had thought to bring a warmer jacket before they rushed out of Felix’s apartment. “He didn’t train me. My uncle taught me the basics, and then I went to the School of Ballet in Fhirdiad. That’s where I met Mercie.” 

Dimitri’s face fell. The way the shadows guarded him, it made him look positively terrifying. Eyepatch, tall stature, blonde hair thrown raggedly in his face. In that moment he looked more the villain than the princely former ballerino that he was. If Annette wasn’t already so worried about Sylvain, she’d probably bolt off in fear.

“What do you mean Gustave didn’t train you?” he asked, his voice low and gravely in the dark. 

Now, how was Annette going to talk herself out of this without pointing fingers directly at Dimitri? She had to do this delicately, to avoid having to chase another grown ass man with emotional issues in the dark of the night. 

“Um, no. He left when I was a kid. To um, teach you.” 

_ Nailed it, Annette. _

“I see.” Dimitri grew quiet once more, even as they rounded the corner with still no sign of Sylvain anywhere. He turned the flashlight off on his phone, frowning as he stared at the screen. If there was anything wrong, though, he didn’t say anything. 

“I’m sorry that I brought it up,” Annette sighed. “I’m a big dummy. I’m not like, mad at you or anything. Objectively, I know my dad is the one that sucks, but—” 

“I apologize for my silence. I suppose that…” Dimitri paused, as if trying to search for the proper words. “I suppose that I never thought much about why your father never brought you by.”

“Well, I assume he doesn’t talk much about me.” Her mind flashed back to the disastrous lunch date that she had with Gustave. She caused a scene in a diner because of him. An actual  _ scene. _ Annette didn’t cause  _ scenes _ in family diners! 

“On the contrary. I heard quite a bit about you from him,” Dimitri said. He ran a hand through his hair, brushing it off of his forehead. Like this he didn’t seem so intimidating. He didn’t seem like someone she wanted to hate. 

It felt almost like not hating Dimitri was a betrayal against Felix, but at the same time, Dimitri wouldn’t have been there if Felix didn’t think that he was important enough to join the search. Maybe Felix was changing too, just as much as she was. 

“Are you just saying that to make me feel better?” Annette asked. “He left when I was like, thirteen. Even before then, he was barely ever around. I don’t know what he would have to say about me.” 

“He told me about how you were always begging him to get you Cassandra Charon’s autograph every time he went to Fhirdiad.”

Annette turned to face Dimitri, her eyes narrowed. “Any budding ballerina would have wanted Cassandra Charon’s autograph!” 

“He also told me that one time you ate an entire gallon tub of ice cream, then did twenty pirouettes and threw up on your uncle’s favorite rose bush.” 

Her entire face went white. She had forgotten about that until that exact moment, for good reason. Goddess, her father couldn’t be assed to teach her how to do a pirouette, but he could tell his prize student how she horked up so much Neapolitan that she couldn’t even smell strawberry chapstick for a year without getting nauseous?

“Okay, I believe you.” Annette threw her hands up in the air in surrender. “Please, just don’t tell Felix about that.” 

Dimitri grew quiet once again, his lone eye seemingly focusing on something that wasn’t actually there. “I don’t think that will be much of a problem. I’m still surprised that Felix called me tonight.” 

Right. Sylvain. They were supposed to be looking for him.

There was a small coffee shop up ahead, one that still had a flickering  _ open _ sign in the window. It was a longshot, but perhaps they would find him there. The two walked in silence, the only sound coming from Annette thanking Dimitri for holding the door. A bell tinkled overhead, alerting the sleepy-looking barista to their presence. 

“Excuse me, we’re looking for a friend of ours,” Dimitri explained while Annette scanned the few shop patrons for Sylvain’s shock of red hair. “He’s about this tall, ginger hair…” 

“Seiros Ballet Company shirt?” the Barista asked.

“Yes.” 

“Left about ten minutes ago,” she shrugged. The look on her face showed little concern, likely because all she wanted was to get home and sleep. Annette could relate.

“Did you see which way he went?” Annette nearly hopped over the counter, her hands pressed against the formica, as if that would make her any more intimidating. 

“No? Now, are you going to buy something, or—”

“Thanks, bye!” Annette grabbed Dimitri’s wrist, and started dragging him towards the door. Despite the fact that he was way taller than she was, and stacked like a pancake breakfast, he did not protest being dragged back outside into the cool night air. 

“He couldn’t have gone that far…” she mumbled under her breath, still dragging Dimitri behind her. “I’m gonna text Felix and Mercie.” 

Annette added the other three to a group chat, sending a quick message to Felix and Mercedes to let them know what they found out. She then slipped her phone back into her pocket, already scanning the horizon to try to find her friend’s missing boyfriend.

“Annette,” Dimitri cleared his throat. “I just wanted to apologize.”

“For what?” She crossed her arms over her chest, mostly to try to draw more heat into her body, but also to look slightly more intimidating. 

“I didn’t know that I stripped you of your father. I had just assumed—”

“Don’t.” Annette shrugged. “It’s not your fault, Dimitri. Am I bitter? Yeah. But, I’m also grown enough to know that you’re not the problem. My dad fucked up, not you.” 

It was hard enough to say that, to be the bigger person. Because part of her did want to blame Dimitri. After all, he was the easy target. He wasn’t her dad, the one who  _ actually _ fucked up. But, pointing fingers every which way wouldn’t help her, and it wouldn’t bring her dad back into her life. It wouldn’t magically make him not a shitty father. 

It would just make her a shitty person.

“Then, allow me to provide a bargaining ship of sorts.” Dimitri cracked a small smile. “One embarrassing story for another.”

Annette couldn’t hide the grin that grew on her face. “Fine. But it better be a good one.” 

“When I was eleven, I was leaning a solo for that year’s recital. My step-sister, Edelgard, had just won an award for her violin playing, so I was determined to do a good job.” Dimitri paused. “And I was so focused on my dancing, that I didn’t notice what I was doing and crashed face first into the mirror—”

“And shattered it into a million pieces! That was  _ you?” _ Full-bodied laughter shook through Annette’s stomach, doubling her over as she wheezed.  _ “You’re _ Mitya?” 

“That’s my nickname.” If it weren’t for the streetlamps, Annette would have missed the blush searing across Dimitri’s cheeks. Was he embarrassed? 

“Well, we’re practically brother and sister now, Mitya.” Now Annette was the one blushing. “I don’t know why I said that. I’m sorry, I’m an idiot.” 

But, Dimitri was laughing. A real, full laugh. It was a sharp contrast to the Dimitri she viewed through the two way mirror in the dance studio, the one curled up crying on Byleth’s lap. “No, no. I’d be glad to call you my sister, Annette.” 

“You can call me Annie, then.” she paused. “Big bro.” 

As much as she wanted to continue the banter, there was still the elephant in the room hovering over their heads. Not only was Sylvain still missing, but would Felix be okay with her getting buddy-buddy with his mortal enemy? Just as she was about to bring it up again, both of their phones buzzed in tandem. 

**Felix:** We found him.

—

While Dimitri and Annette were reconciling a kinship that they didn’t even know they had, Felix and Mercedes had been searching high and low for Sylvain. When they received Annette’s text, letting them know that he was sighted somewhere near the coffee shop a few blocks away from the cottage, they immediately headed in that direction.

While Felix had known Mercedes for quite some time, had danced with her even, he had never seen her like this before. On the outside, she was as calm and collected as always. However, he could see the cracks in her armor start to chip away, revealing the panic that hid under her skin. She wasn’t like Annette, loud with her heart painted in neon on her sleeve. No, Mercedes kept all of her cards close to her chest, and always had for as long as he’d known her. 

“In defense of Sylvain. He’s an idiot, but try not to hold this against him,” Felix sighed. He thought that once they were adults, he wouldn’t have to spend all his time cleaning up Sylvain’s messes, but here he was, twenty four years old, and still carrying the fucking mop. 

“Felix, if I didn’t hold years of  _ philandering _ against Sylvain, why would I abandon him for this?” Her tone was sharper than Felix was used to, coming from Mercedes. 

“Has he been keeping up with his meds?” Felix asked, brushing off Mercedes’ barbs just as she had always brushed off his. 

“Yes. I don’t… He got a phone call, and stepped outside, and when I went to check on him he was gone.” She wrung her hands in her sweater, her lips pursed. 

“We’ll find him. He always turns up eventually,” Felix reassured her.

Mercedes tried to smile, but it didn’t reach anywhere near her eyes. “Yes, I suppose we will.” 

“Do you know who called him?” Felix asked, trying to fill the empty silence.

“I think it was his father?” Mercedes offered.

The color drained from Felix’s face, and he took off running as well. She followed behind him, but it was harder to keep up in her gardening crocs. “Where are you going?” 

“I think I know where he is.” Felix muttered a string of curses under his breath. If it was Sylvain’s father that called, there could be a million reasons why Sylvain was set off. However, whenever his family right pissed him off, there was one particular spot that Felix knew his friend would run off to.

He stopped in front of the Goddess Pond, observing a figure standing on the edge of the fishing pier. In the moonlight, Felix could see the shock of bright red on the man’s head, the slump of his shoulders as he sat down on the rickety wood.

“So, you found me, huh?” Sylvain mumbled as Felix came up behind him, Mercedes hot on his heels. 

“I told you the last time you did this shit that I would kick your ass if you ever did it again!” Felix snapped. He crossed his arms over his chest, then uncrossed them, then remembered that  _ oh yeah, _ he should probably text Dimitri and Annette.

“Sylvain, what were you thinking?” Mercedes curled her hands into balls, but before she could yell, she fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around Sylvain’s broad shoulders. 

“I’m sorry, Mercie,” Sylvain mumbled into her hair. Felix felt like he was intruding on something that he probably shouldn’t have, but  _ fuck it. _ Since when had he ever been timely, or gave a shit what others thought of him? 

He cleared his throat, causing the two to jump and turn back around. Before anyone could say anything, however, Annette and Dimitri crested the hill and made it down to the little pond. 

“Sylvain, you better not have made Mercie cry!” Annette called, before crushing Felix in a hug. There was a lot she was going to have to explain to Felix, but now wasn’t the time. “Are you okay? I’ve got band-aids, I think…”

“I’m fine,” Sylvain said.

Felix frowned. “Bullshit.”

“Don’t  _ bullshit  _ me, Fe.” Sylvain stood up and walked over to Felix, displaying his height over his friend. “I just needed some air.”

“Then answer your fucking phone! Don’t make your girlfriend worried sick because you can’t handle something!” Felix nearly wanted to throttle him. It was the same shit as always, except this time Ingrid wasn’t the one grabbing Sylvain by the collar and dragging him home. 

“Miklan’s out of prison, so I think I have a bit of a right to be fucked up, Felix.” Sylvain’s words lingered long after they left his mouth, snuffing out every bit of conversation that could have even attempted to be. 

Annette wasn’t quite sure who Miklan was, or what was going on, but she could tell by everyone’s body language that whomever he was, this was serious. She was doubly sure when both Dimitri, whom she had never heard swear ever before, and Felix said  _ “Oh shit” _ at the exact same moment. 

“Who’s Miklan?” Annette whispered to Felix, not wanting to be left out, but also wanting to respect Sylvain. 

“His brother,” Felix swallowed. “He tried to kill Sylvain.”

A pit formed deep in Annette’s stomach. She didn’t know what she should do, or say, or if she should even be there. Yes, Sylvain joked that she was his new best friend, but she only really knew him in the context of Felix or Mercedes. Of course he was a real person, but she had never tried to peel back his layers. 

“So, what are you going to do now?” Felix asked, his eyes focused on the cracks between the boards in the pier. 

“Dunno,” Sylvain shrugged. “Get drunk. Cry. Call my therapist in the morning and hope I can still make it to rehearsal without hurling.” 

“Mercedes, can you stay with him tonight?” Dimitri asked. “I’d offer, but I think he’d enjoy your company more.” 

“Yes. I’ll stay with him.” Mercedes nodded. 

“Call me if you need anything, Sylvain.” Dimitri clapped a hand on his friend’s shoulder, then turned to leave. “And Felix. I know things have been  _ different _ with us, but know that the door is open.” 

He started to walk back towards the cottage, towards his car, but he paused before he got too far out of range. “That also goes for you too,  _ little sis.”  _

“Little sis?” Felix asked, but by the time he turned to ask Dimitri, the blond was already gone. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my sister  
> this is my brother  
> we are siblings   
> and we care for each other


	14. Play Your Etude of Sighs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their time dancing together for the Spring Charity Showcase is coming to a close, but a new chapter will soon begin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Kaerra and Strawberry_Requiem for helping me out this chapter with the dumb things I get stuck on.

“Move out of the way!” Hilda shouted as she tried to plow her way to the front of the crowd gathered around the results of the  _ Manon _ auditions. Felix and Annette were towards the back of the pack, easily bowled over by Hilda’s steamroller maneuver. “Aw  _ shit _ , I got a solo  _ again.” _

“Oh, congrats, Hilda!” Annette said, still trying to swallow the nervous bile that was rising in the back of her throat. Of course Hilda would get a solo. She had been in the company for years, and was an exceptional dancer. There was no reason for Annette to be jealous, and yet she couldn’t stop the tips of her ears from burning scarlet. 

“No, no. This is  _ awful _ . Byleth’s gonna make me  _ work.” _ Hilda held out the  _ wor _ part of  _ work _ , somehow turning a one syllable word into a ten. 

“It’s okay, Hilda.” Marianne patted Hilda on the back twice. “We can work together?” 

That seemed to placate Hilda enough to get them to move to the side, allowing for the other dancers to see what parts they got. To be honest, Annette was surprised that Hilda had showed up at all, considering the fact that Sylvain had texted Felix earlier that morning to just tell him what he got. 

Then again, according to Mercie, Sylvain hadn’t left his apartment since the night he tried to run. 

One by one, the crowd dwindled down as the dancers received their roles. The narrow hallway was nearly empty by the time Annette and Felix made it to the front. She had a hand thrown over her eyes, her mouth curled in a pained frown.

“I can’t look, Felix,” Annette cried.

Truth be told, Felix wasn’t sure  _ he _ could look either. He was confident about his audition, and his skills, but that seed of doubt still ached in his belly.  _ Fuck, fuck, fuck… _ He scanned the list, skipping over names and roles until he found what he was looking for.

_ Felix Hugo Fraldarius: des Grieux _

He let out an immediate sigh of relief. He had done it. He got the role that he had been desperate for, the role he had nearly pushed himself to his limits to get. It was now in his grasp, tangible,  _ his. _

But, there was one more name he had to check, the one that belonged to the quaking woman beside him.

_ Annette Fantine Dominic: Manon _

“Holy shit,” Felix mumbled under his breath. He turned and lifted Annette (who still had her eyes covered), spinning her around with a dopey grin on his face. “Annette, open your eyes.”

“I don’t want to—” she cut herself off, stopping to read the text on the posting. “Holy  _ shit!”  _

Annette threw her arms around Felix’s neck and kissed him hard. She wasn’t sure how she managed to get the lead, not when she felt like her entire audition was a massive flop, but  _ Goddess _ was she delighted to be able to dance with Felix again.

“I gotta go tell Mercie.” She gave Felix a quick kiss on the cheek. “Wanna grab lunch before dress rehearsal?” 

Felix had barely recovered, his mind still buzzing around the fact that he had gotten the lead. He had. Not Sylvain, not Dedue, and  _ fuck _ , not Dimitri.

_ Dimitri. _ That was another can of worms that he hadn’t yet dared to open. Something had happened with him and Annette while they were searching for Sylvain, but Felix hadn’t tried to pry. Dimitri had called Annette  _ Little Sis, _ which was odd. Not  _ upsetting _ , but strange.

Fuck. As much as Felix didn’t want to admit it, maybe now was the right time to try to reconcile with Dimitri. Dr. Arter had brought it up once or twice since they started meeting, but it never really felt right to Felix. The walls he built up were there for a reason. They were to protect him, to shelter him from the pounding attacks from the outside world.

But, Annette had chipped through the bricks, had crawled under and climbed over. Maybe she was trying to show him the way out, to guide him back out into the sun that he had hid from for so long.

“Actually, I think there’s something I need to do first.” Felix leaned over and kissed Annette on the top of the head. “I love you.” 

**Felix:** Meet me at Duran Downtown at 12.

**Dimitri:** Okay.

—

Duran Downtown was a small, yet upscale kind of restaurant, one you’d expect to see businessmen taking their lunch at. Its menu wasn’t particularly adventurous, but the plating was sleek and the atmosphere soothing. 

Felix had arrived first, taking a highball table near the front window. He ordered sparkling water with a single wedge of lemon, and sipped on it while he watched for any sign of the fallen prince. 

He scanned over the menu in a vain attempt to get his eyes to do something—anything other than fixate on the sidewalk outside. Despite the coping mechanisms that Dr. Arter taught him, there was still a flutter of nausea in the pit of his stomach that wouldn’t seem to go away. 

But this was what he was working towards: forgiving Dimitri Blaiddyd. Moving on. He knew that their friendship could never go back to the way that it was when they were children. The cracks that Glenn’s death made and Felix himself widened couldn’t ever go back together perfectly. He could, however, seal them up, work them over until the could at least meet in the middle. 

If Annette could do it, maybe he could too.

“Ah, Felix.” Dimitri stood by the empty chair, as if waiting for permission to sit even though no one else would be joining them. 

“Are you planning to sit, or —” Felix cut himself off. He was here to talk to Dimitri, not shoot him full of verbal poisoned barbs. This wasn’t a trap, wasn’t a confrontation or a battle that needed to be won. It was lunch with someone he once called a friend. 

“Thanks for coming.” Felix looked away. “It was short notice.” 

That was like an apology, right? 

Dimitri finally took a seat, his enormous form somehow dwarfing the highball chair. “I heard you got the lead in  _ Manon _ .” 

It seemed more like a statement to Felix than a congratulations, but there was no need to be nasty about it. This was fine. It was fine. Everything was  _ fine _ . 

Before he could respond, however, the waitress slid up to the table, her pad of paper already in hand. Dimitri ordered a Coke and a plate of kid’s chicken tenders, and Felix opted for some sort of ancient grains bowl with spice-rubbed steak. Part of him wanted to chide Dimitri for picking the blandest option in the entire restaurant, but that wouldn’t get him anywhere either.

Silence passed over the table again as soon as the waitress left. Dimitri seemed overly preoccupied with the napkin roll on the table, his lone eye consciously focused on anything  _ but _ Felix. 

“I’m thinking about teaching,” Dimitri said. “Ballet, that is.” 

Felix bit down on the inside of his cheek, trying his hardest not to say something rude and snarky back. “Is Mercedes taking time off?” 

“No… There are a lot of students planning on enrolling in classes in the Fall. I thought that maybe we could split them.” 

The waitress brought Dimitri’s Coke, dropping it off at the table with little fanfare. He swirled his straw around the glass, watching as the ice clinked against the sides. “Why did you really ask me here, Felix?” 

That was a loaded question if Felix had ever fucking heard one. 

“I…” Felix swallowed, his mouth dry. “I’ve been seeing a therapist.”

It was painfully obvious that Dimitri was trying not to look surprised, but even a dancer of his caliber couldn’t hide it. Felix had seen Dimitri keep a serene composure even while dancing with a broken toe, and yet  _ this _ was what cracked him. 

Felix Fraldarius, going to therapy.

“I don’t want to forget Glenn,” Felix began. “But, it’s also…”

His voice trailed off into silence. The walls around him were closing in, and despite all the concentrated breathing it was near impossible for him to push them back away. “It’s not your fault he’s gone. And I’m a fool for letting myself think that for so long.”

Dimitri bit his lower lip, his back hunching over the table like Felix’s words had punched him straight in the gut.

“I’ve spent all this time wondering what I could have done differently.” Dimitri looked up through the hair falling in his face, his eye seemingly searching for something not there. “If I hadn’t gone to Zanado’s. If I hadn’t had so much to drink. If I had just waited…”

“Yeah, well, we can’t change the past,” Felix sighed. “But maybe what happens next doesn’t have to fucking suck.”

“I can drink to that.” Dimitri raised his glass of Coke. The corner of his mouth quirked up in a half smile, but quickly fell again. “I really do apologize, Felix.”

Felix shook his head. “Don’t. Just shut up and eat your chicken fingers.”

“That I can do.”

—

“Don’t you think this is enough glitter?” Annette asked as Yuri dusted another layer on the bits of her skin that her costume didn’t cover. If he kept going, it might take her literal years to scrub it all off.

Yuri paused for a moment, his metallic purple eyeshadow glinting in the bright light of the dressing room. “No such thing.”

“Are you sure this isn’t going to rub off?” Felix stepped out from behind a curtained changing area, gesturing vaguely at the brush strokes of black and UV paint across his bare chest. He too was covered in a similar layer of shimmer, though his was a deeper silver compared to her sunshine gold.

Annette felt her heart near-stop in her chest. Sure, she had seen Felix shirtless before. She had  _ danced _ with Felix shirtless before, and done  _ other _ things too. She knew what those muscles felt like under her hands, and yet seeing him dolled up like the prince of the night made her fall in love with him all over again. 

“Honey, I know what I’m doing. Have a little faith in me.” Yuri put down the glitter pouf and turned Annette’s chair to face the mirror. 

She couldn’t believe that it was actually her in the reflection. Between Yuri’s makeup skills, Constance’s hair expertise, and the way that Balthus and Hapi designed her costume, Annette  _ felt _ like the embodiment of sunshine. Gold eyeshadow, sparkling white painted-on freckles that looked like light flittering through the leaves, sunflowers and reflective ornaments stuck in her pumpkin-colored hair… 

“You two are done. Get Hilda and Claude in here on your way out,” Yuri said. 

The final dress rehearsal. It was hard to believe that they were already at this point; it felt like just yesterday that they met for the first time and he told her that she couldn’t  _ glissade _ for shit. January to February to March, and now April… Only four months, but it felt like near a lifetime.

“You ready?” Felix asked as he wound his hand in hers. 

Annette squeezed twice. “As I’ll ever be.”

She rested her head against his arm as they stood in the wings, watching as the other dancers ran through their choreography. 

“We’re next,” Felix said. He looked around to see if anyone else was watching them, then pressed a quick kiss to her glitter-covered cheek. 

Her heart thrummed loudly in her chest. It made her entire being quake, though she didn’t know why she was quite so nervous. It was just a rehearsal. A dress rehearsal, but a rehearsal nonetheless. If she made a mistake here, they could all laugh it off. And yet the nerves still ate away at the pit of her stomach.

The curtains opened, the music started, and all that anxiety melted away. She knew the dance, knew her steps, knew  _ Felix. _ After all they’d been through, dancing with him was like dancing with an extension of herself. By the time they hit the final pose, Annette felt like she was fully and truly  _ alive _ . 

“You’re gonna make us all look bad,” Claude quipped as the pair passed by him and Hilda. 

The rest of the rehearsal sailed by smoothly, even after Hilda tried to claim that she couldn’t kick as high as normal because of period cramps. Marianne unceremoniously ratted her out, and they had to re-do the dance with the proper kick. By the time everyone regrouped in the dressing room, it was nearly ten o’clock at night, and everyone was tired and sweaty and comparing blisters.

“Anyone wanna go to Zanado’s?” Hilda asked. When she was greeted with lukewarm response, she rolled her eyes. “I’ll get first round?”

“I wouldn’t mind a drink, but I think I’ll be scrubbing this gold goo off all night.” Annette frowned. That, and she was sure she smelled like an armpit. 

“I am thinking that will actually have befitting of Zanado’s,” Petra giggled. 

“I’m game.” Felix shrugged. “Hey, ‘Nette, can you grab something from my bag?”

Annette raised an eyebrow, her hand already reaching for Felix’s plain black duffel. “Sure? What is it?”

“Left pocket.”

She stuck her hand in the left pocket, but the only thing in there was a square black box. Her heart nearly stopped in her chest, until she realized that it was way too big to be a ring box. Not that she wouldn’t ever consider marrying Felix, but A) there was plenty of time for that and B) if Felix tried to pull a public proposal she would immediately try to take his temperature because Felix just didn’t  _ do _ PDA. 

“Are you going to open it?” Felix asked. He crossed his arms over his bare chest, the stars and streaks remaining stubbornly in place. 

Annette snapped back to reality and popped the lid of the box. Inside was a pendant composed of a teardrop-shaped sapphire, cushioned with an array of diamonds. The whole thing hung on a delicate white-gold chain and sparkled in the surrounding lights of the dressing room.

“Felix, it’s—”

Sylvain let out a low whistle. “Hey Fe, can you tell me where to get something like that?”

“I thought Annette was your new best friend?” Felix snickered.

“Oh, you’re right.” Sylvain turned to her. “Can you ask Felix where he got that for me?”

Annette giggled as Felix slipped the necklace around her neck. “Only if you agree to clean out my car for me.”

  
Sylvain opened his mouth, but Mercedes placed a hand on his shoulder and shook her head. “Trust me. You  _ really _ do not want to do that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not 100% happy with this chapter, but we're nearing the end and I hope that the last chapter finishes strong! 
> 
> After I finish this fic, I'm planning to go back to working on some of my original fiction. So, we'll see what happens regarding other works, or if I decide to add some oneshots to this series. Who knows?
> 
> Thank you again for reading. If you enjoyed this chapter, please leave kudos or a comment!


	15. Always Be Like This

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> __
> 
> Say that you'll hold me forever
> 
> Say that the wind won't change on us
> 
> Say that we'll stay with each other
> 
> And it will always be like this

“Are you nervous?” Annette asked Mercedes while she adjusted the hem of her costume. “You’re on first, after all.”

Mercedes toyed with the ribbons of her pointe shoes, tying and untying them over and over. “No, I wouldn’t say that.” 

Annette had known Mercedes von Martritz for long enough that she knew that was a lie. However, she wasn’t going to push it, not when they were this close to performing. 

“I really hope I don’t screw up…” Annette mumbled. Ever since somehow scoring the lead role in Manon, it felt like she was living in some kind of dream. So, it was only a matter of time before something made her finally wake up. 

“I’m telling you, Felix. That car was an archaeological dig of frappuccino cups. How does she drink so many frappuccinos?” Sylvain’s voice echoed as he and Felix came around the corner.

“I told you that you didn’t want to clean her car…” Mercedes sighed.

Annette’s face burned bright red, even though the layers upon layers of stage makeup and shimmer that Yuri had caked onto her skin. “It’s really not that many frapps!” 

“I take it back… Felix, you’re my best friend again.” Sylvain wrapped his arms around Felix’s torso, lifting him off of the ground while Felix pouted.

“Please stop hugging me.”

“But we’re  _ best friends again _ , Felix.”

“Are we done horsing around back here?” Seteth, the ballet master, asked. He somehow managed to slip backstage without anyone noticing him. Annette could only envy his silent dancer’s feet, especially when for years her uncle called her an elephant every time she landed a jump.

“Yes, sir,” the four said in unison, like a group of children getting scolded.

Felix grabbed Annette’s hand and ran his thumb over her knuckles as the remaining dancers filed into the wings. She watched as Seteth conversed with the stage-snuggied Linhardt, probably coordinating the last few pieces before the show started.

“I feel like I’m sweating buckets,” Annette sighed. “Felix, am I moist?”

“Please don’t say the word  _ moist _ .” Felix looked both ways, then pressed a small kiss to the top of her very hairsprayed head. “You’re fine.”

Annette nodded. “Right. I’m graceful. I’m an elegant slice of daylight.”

“Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you all for joining us here tonight for this year’s Spring Charity Showcase. Our dancers have worked hard to provide you with top notch entertainment…” Seteth’s voice droned on and on, so much so that Annette could barely pay attention to any word he was saying. She was a bundle of nerves, and she was pretty sure that even if someone spoke directly to her she wouldn’t notice.

“—enjoy our show!” Seteth’s voice was drowned out by the sound of applause. The lights dimmed and the curtains closed once more.

It was showtime.

Felix and Annette watched as Mercedes and Sylvain tiptoed through their beautiful, delicate piece. Somehow Sylvain had pulled off the angelic look, even next to the blessing of a woman that was Mercedes von Martritz. Their flowing white costumes swirled around them through the dreamlike orchestration, ending with Mercedes in a split in Sylvain’s arms.

Bernadetta, the stage hand that Annette had barely ever seen, yanked on the ropes to pull the curtains to a close, which signaled the others to start rearranging the set. She saw Ignatz and Lindhardt, wearing his tech-black Snuggie, scramble to move the scenery into the right positions. 

When the curtain opened again, Marianne and Dedue began their  _ pas de deux. _ Their dance was full of daring lifts and dips, showcasing how delicate Marianne was, and how strong and dynamic Dedue could be. They danced elegantly, pure poetry in motion. For a moment, Annette even wondered how Marianne could keep perfect composure, even while being thrown that high into the air. 

Next up was Dorothea and Petra, performing an eerily in-sync dance for noon. They were dressed and styled exactly the same, probably playing off the fact that noon is the exact middle, and casts no shadow. Seeing the two dance, Annette couldn’t quite understand why she received the lead over Dorothea. Every move she made was  _ stunning. _ Just watching her made Annette feel small. 

Then, it was time for Felix and Annette. She readied herself in position, waiting for the curtain to open and the music to start. 

Edelgard’s violin sounded, followed by Lysithea’s flute and Lorenz’s oboe. Annette made her way on stage, flowing flawlessly through her turns and steps. The white and gold of her stage costume flounced around her, making her look positively radiant.

She completed a pirouette, which faced her back towards the audience. There, she saw him: Gustave. He was sitting in the front row between Rhea and Dimitri, a heavy frown on his face.

He came to one of her shows? No, he probably came because it was the Spring Charity Showcase. It was one of the biggest events in all of Garreg Mach. Anyone who was anyone was there. 

Before she could utterly embarrass herself on stage, however, the shift in the music snapped her back to attention.

Felix flowed onto the stage like inky black night himself, the Grape Nut face long shed for something akin to  _ hunger. _ He looked at her like he wanted to devour her, like he was born to chase her and claim her as his own. 

Her heart raced in her chest as she made it through the next series of steps, his hands tracing the lines of her body. If they weren’t on stage, she was sure she’d just kiss him there and then. Beautiful Felix, marvelous Felix. She was made to touch him, to dance with him.

He went for the lift, and with the lights of the stage and the metric ton of glitter on her skin, she felt like she was flying, like the entire audience existed only for her. There was a gasp from the crowd, and she sunk back down, sliding against Felix’s chest before falling into the dip.

When they finished, the audience  _ roared. _ Annette watched as Dimitri stood from his chair, with Gustave reluctantly following. A standing ovation… And yet, Annette didn’t need her father’s approval to know that she and Felix  _ owned _ that stage.

“Shit, you two are going to make us look  _ soooo _ bad!” Hilda whispered as Felix and Annette returned to the wings. 

Claude clapped her on the back, leading her towards their positions. “Don’t sell yourself short, Hilda. We’ve got this.” 

Mercedes rose from the floor and wrapped Annette in a vice-grip hug. She smelled of vanilla and lavender and sweat and hairspray. “You were beautiful!”

“So were you!” Annette giggled. “Was it really that good?”

“Annie, do not put yourself down now.” 

Felix wrapped an arm around Annette’s waist as Claude and Hilda’s music started, the deep, sultry sounds of Night. Annette’s heart was pounding louder than Caspar’s drum, taken with the subtle touch. 

Hilda and Claude’s dance raced to a crescendo, then slipped quietly to the end. The curtain closed once more, signaling the end of the performance. 

—

“We killed it out there!” Annette shouted, before spider-monkey hopping onto Felix’s back. Her entire body still buzzed with adrenaline, which almost prevented her from feeling the heavy fatigue in her limbs.

The added weight of Annette on his back made Felix sigh, but he couldn’t say no to her, not when she was that adorable. “We did.”

Felix was never a touchy person, but with Annette it just felt right. He wanted her close to him, wanted to see her smile every damn minute of every  _ fucking _ day. A loose hair of hers fell down his forehead and tickled his nose, and he couldn’t even bring himself to be mildly annoyed.

“Do you want to shower before going to Zanado’s?” Felix asked.

“We could save time and—”

“Annette.” Gustave’s voice cut through the lobby, his storm-colored eyes locked on hers. 

She swallowed, but the lump she expected to find in her throat wasn’t there. “Dad?” 

Annette slid down Felix’s back and landed on the floor with only a slight wobble. Felix slipped behind her, his mouth already curled in a heavy scowl. There was no way that he’d let Gustave ruin this night for them—for  _ Annette. _ But before Felix could throw the first verbal punch, Gustave extended a bouquet of pink roses and lilies in Annette’s direction.

“You did a great job, Annette,” he said. His eyes darted away from hers, the floral arrangement hanging between them. This was the olive branch, that little bit of acknowledgement she had searched for her entire life, and now that it was here… 

“Thank you.” She grabbed the bouquet and brought it up to her nose. Its perfumed scent filled her with a sickly sort of nostalgia. Her mom used to get her flowers like these after recitals when she was little, but when handed to her by her father, they took on an entirely different meaning. “But I can’t accept these.” 

“‘Nette…” Felix mumbled.

“What do you mean you can’t accept them?” Gustave asked. The cellophane wrapping crinkled in his grasp. 

“I mean I can’t, Dad.” Annette tried to smile, but it didn’t reach anywhere near her eyes. “Come on, Felix. Let’s go.”

Felix gave Gustave one last glance before he and Annette walked off towards the exit. Gustave didn’t try to follow.

—

“I can’t believe we’ve made it through another Showcase,” Dorothea said as she raised her cosmo in the air, the liquid dangerously close to sloshing over the sides of the glass. 

Annette looked into her violently pink drink, her body still thrumming with adrenaline, and possibly bits of glitter that she had huffed while Yuri painted her down. 

So much had changed since the first time she came to Zanado’s. Back then Felix could barely dance with her, and yet he didn’t run away when she nearly set her kitchen on fire and dumped water on him in an attempt to cheer him up.

Now he sat next to her with an actual  _ smile _ on his face. He didn’t look like he wanted to run. Glenn’s ghost was now a quiet observer instead of the elephant in the room. He looked  _ happy _ . He  _ was _ happy. 

Annette rested her head against Felix’s shoulder, her hair falling in soft waves around her face. 

“What?” Felix asked.

“Nothing.” She smiled. “I just love you.” 

“Get a room, you two!” Hilda shouted as she slid into the booth next to Annette, pressing her further into his side. She opened her mouth to say something else, but was cut off by the sound of Byleth’s voice cutting through the music of the bar.

“Hilda, nice job on the leg,” Byleth said.

“She had my hand in a death grip the whole time,” Dimitri explained. 

Hilda rolled her eyes. “Byleth, do you have  _ no _ confidence in me?” 

“No comment.” Byleth turned towards the bar. “Drinks?”

“Rum and Coke, please.” Dimitri came by the table, though he didn’t yet sit down. “Felix, Annette. You did a fantastic job.” 

“And I didn’t?” Hilda and Dorothea said in sync, both equally as scandalized. Dimitri’s face flushed bright red. He stammered a few times, clearly trying to dig himself out of that hole.

“Thanks, big bro.” Annette chuckled, the cocktail already making her head feel light and airy. Things were good. Maybe, for once in her life, they could stay that way. 

The bar door opened, revealing Mercedes and Sylvain. Both still had damp hair, though Sylvain’s was starting to dry and stick up stubbornly in places. 

“Someone just got laid…” Hilda mumbled under her breath, which turned Dimitri another six shades of scarlet. 

By the time the pair reached the table, Byleth and Ingrid were back with drinks and Marianne had returned from the bathroom. The remaining dancers, orchestra members, and tech crew mingled around the bar, each spread in their own little cliques. 

“Sorry we ran a little late,” Mercedes said. She tucked a lock of blonde hair behind her ear. “Traffic.”

Annette raised her eyebrow. “Traffic.”

Sylvain started talking, but all the noise in the bar faded into the background when Felix looked at Annette. Her stormy-sea eyes, the freckles that danced across her nose, even though she always tried to hide them.  _ Goddess, _ he never thought he’d be in love, and yet here he was with the world in his arms.

“Let’s grab some air for a second,” he said, nearly sweeping Annette off of her feet. 

She followed him out to the bar’s back patio area. It was late, but the fairy lights draped around the pavilion kept the darkness at bay. They sat down on the edge of a small fountain where a few cigarette buds lay at their feet.

“You okay?” She asked as she tangled her fingers in his. 

“I’m fine.” Felix frowned. “I just wanted to spend some time with you.” 

Annette allowed herself to relax for a moment. Everything was okay. “It’s kind of romantic out here, with the fountain and all.”

“I wouldn’t really know.”

“You’re way more romantic than you think you are, Felix Fraldarius.” Annette booped Felix on the nose, making him blush. “Hey, do you have any change?”

“Uh, maybe?” He rooted around in his wallet until he found a single penny, then handed it to her. “Are you planning on making a wish?”

_ “We’re _ gonna make a wish. Hold my hand.” Annette stood up and wrapped her hand around his, the penny pressed between their palms. 

“What are we wishing for?” Felix asked.

Annette paused, her pink-drink addled thoughts rolling over her like a white-out winter storm. “I don’t know. Just. For things to always be like this.”

Felix nodded. “On three?”

“One…” 

“Two…”

“Three!” They tossed the coin together, their voices blending as one. The penny made a big  _ splash,  _ then settled down to the bottom with the other loose change from patrons past. 

It grew quiet for a moment, the sounds of the fountain and the Spring air the only thing to remind them that this was real, that they existed. Their eyes met, amber on blue-green, two hearts beating as one.

Annette closed the gap between them, sealing her lips on his. His hands caught her waist as she threw her arms around his neck, as if she’d die if she couldn’t touch every last bit of his skin. She felt every breath from his lungs, every  _ I love you _ that had ever rolled off his tongue like the sweetest frappuccino she had ever ordered.

If she could spend eternity in the arms of Felix Hugo Fraldarius, she could die happy.

Four months ago, Felix’s life was still upside down. He carried so much pain in his chest that he thought that he’d never live a day without that ache. But then he met Annette, and she was like sunshine, and somehow she melted all the ice inside of him, and somehow he was whole again.

He rested his chin on the top of her head, his focus on the sea of stars above them. His voice was so soft, barely above a whisper, but she could hear it all the same. 

“I will always love you, Annette.”

And what more could she ask for than that?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has read this fic. Please leave a kudos or a comment if you can. 
> 
> When I started this project, I didn't think I was going to finish it. Hell, I didn't even think I was going to start it. I don't write long fics. (And if you're here because you read my Robin/Gaius fic years ago, as much as I love that fic... that's exactly the reason I don't do long fics! I don't finish them!!!) 
> 
> I was so burnt out from writing my original work, that before this, I hadn't really written in months. 
> 
> But, here we are. 15 chapters. 42,000 words. And one full Ballet AU.
> 
> It's almost midnight (Because really, when else am I gonna post an update), and my words aren't really forming proper sentences, but know that I appreciate each and every one of you.
> 
> I'm hoping to do one shots in this series as follow ups, but I've actually been inspired to work on my original writings again. So we'll see what happens when it comes to fics in the coming months. 
> 
> I hope everyone is doing well and is safe. Thank you again.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoy this work, please leave a Kudos or a comment, even if it's just nonsense. It would really make my day.
> 
> If you'd like, you can follow me on Tumblr or Twitter. I am Safraninflare there as well.


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